


A Cat Can Look at a King

by lithos_saeculum



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Being a secret catboy is hard work, Coming of Age, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Light Angst, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:56:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25068775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lithos_saeculum/pseuds/lithos_saeculum
Summary: The Niflheim Empire is experimenting on human-animal hybrids, trying to make the perfect soldier. When one of their experiments is stolen by Lucian soldiers, it's decided that the best thing to do would be to remove the non-human appendages and raise the child as a human. No-one thinks about the issues that this might cause.Or: Prompto is a catboy, and it's such a big secret that even he doesn't know about it.
Relationships: Gladiolus Amicitia & Prompto Argentum, Prompto Argentum & Ignis Scientia, Prompto Argentum & Noctis Lucis Caelum
Comments: 470
Kudos: 751





	1. Look what the cat dragged in

**Author's Note:**

> OK, so I know I already have a "Prompto is a cat" fic languishing, but, um, have another "Prompto is a cat" fic! I think this will be about four chapters. Thank you to the nonnies on FFA for the inspiration! ♥

“Dude, what are you doing?” says Noct one night when they’re sitting on the couch in his apartment. They’ve just finished a round of video games and Prompto is halfway to a sugar coma. That’s probably why he doesn’t realise what he’s doing until Noct asks. 

What Prompto is doing: rubbing his head on Noct’s shoulder. And maybe licking his shoulder a little. Prince Noctis, his best friend and also the Prince. And also his best friend. (And maybe his only friend.) 

“Uh!” Prompto says, sitting sharply upright. “Nothing! I almost fell asleep. I’m sorry, I almost fell asleep on your shoulder, I’m sorry.” 

Noct’s staring at him like he’s a weirdo. Which he is, to be fair. Maybe Noct didn’t notice the licking, though. He’s wearing sleeves, after all.

“It’s fine,” Noct says. “Why are you so upset?” 

“I’m not upset!” Prompto says, and smiles as wide as his mouth will go. “Just, uh. Don’t want to be a pain, dude.” 

Noct frowns a little. “You’re not a pain,” he says. He brushes his shoulder and then makes a disgusted face. “Dude. Did you _drool_ on me?” 

“Hahah!” Prompto says. Then he adds another _ha_ , just to give himself more time. Is it better to drool on your BFF or to lick them? Prompto’s not sure. One thing that’s definitely true, though, is that Prompto no longer feels sleepy and relaxed and warm like he did when he accidentally did a weird thing all over Noct. 

“Ugh,” Noct says, then elbows him in the ribs. “Fine. Just for that, it’s your turn to get more snacks.” 

“Haha! Yeah!” Prompto says, jumping to his feet and trying to look as much like a normal person as possible. The look Noct shoots him suggests it isn’t working, but Prompto’s nothing if not an optimist. “Jerky?” 

“Jerky’s a you thing, dude,” Noct says, already turning back to the screen. 

Prompto concedes that this is very true – he really doesn’t get why most people don’t see the wonders of jerky – and collects chips for Noct and jerky for himself. While he’s by the fridge, he steals some cheese. Ignis probably won’t notice. (Ignis probably will notice.) 

Later on, Noct falls asleep on Prompto’s shoulder. It’s OK, though, Prompto has a whole package of jerky to gnaw on, so he’s pretty happy where he is.

~

Prompto remembers the exact day he realised he was… different. It was a hot, sunny July day when he was six years old, the kind of day that always makes him want to curl up and snooze under a bush, and he was in the grocery store with his mom, rubbing his head against her hip. And there was a girl – maybe a year younger than him – coming down the aisle with her own mother, who stopped and stared. 

“Mommy, what’s that boy doing?” the girl asked, laughing. 

“Hush,” her mom murmured. “You shouldn’t laugh at people who are _different_.” 

So that was how Prompto learned he was different. 

~

He asked his mom later – almost a week later, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it. “Mommy, what does it mean when you say someone’s _different_?” 

His mom crouched and smiled, brushing his hair back from his face. “Well, sweetie, it’s a kind thing to say about a person who’s a little strange.” 

“Strange how?” Prompto asked. 

“Oh, it could be anything,” his mom said airily. “Eccentric, or crazy, or maybe just, you know,” she smiled conspiratorially, “a little dumb. Like Mr Moonie.” 

Mr Moonie was a homeless man who sat outside the subway station near their house and talked to himself. He smelled bad and Prompto was kinda scared of him.

That night, Prompto looked in the mirror and wondered if he was strange like Mr Moonie. Or maybe he was just dumb. But he was _different_. 

He didn’t want to be different.

~

Prompto has a list of things he’s not supposed to do. He started it back in elementary school, after he realised there were more things about him that people thought were _different_ than just the head-rubbing, and he’s been adding to it ever since. A lot of things he’d thought were normal turn out maybe… not to be? He doesn’t know why his parents never told him to stop doing that stuff, but they’ve never really paid that much attention to what other people thought. 

_-Don’t purr  
-Don’t scratch trees  
-Don’t rub your head on things  
-Don’t sniff people  
-Don’t sniff trees  
-Don’t sniff anything  
-It’s OK to sniff food, but don’t sniff other people’s food  
-Don’t bite people who touch your stomach when you’re rolling around on your back with your arms and legs in the air  
-Don’t roll around on your back with your arms and legs in the air_

As he progresses through school, the list gets longer and longer, and he realises people will indulge little kids who are being weird because they just think it’s normal little-kid weirdness, but if you carry on being weird once you’re no longer cute, people stop laughing fondly and start – staring.

“Mom, how do you know what’s normal?” he asks his mom one day when he’s ten. 

His mom puts her hand on his cheek and he has to resist the urge to rub against it and purr. His mom always smells really good. He’s getting too big to crawl into her lap and he knows he’s not supposed to sniff her, but – sometimes he forgets. 

“Don’t worry about being normal, darling,” his mom says. Which isn’t really an answer. Prompto does worry about being normal. But apparently Mom’s not going to be a lot of help, and Dad isn’t really around much, so he just keeps adding to his list.

_-Don’t fall asleep under a bush  
-Don’t fall asleep anywhere except in a bed like a normal person  
-Don’t chase stuff  
-Especially not laser pointers  
-Especially not the teacher’s laser pointers  
-Don’t hiss at dogs  
-Sit properly in class  
-Don’t fall asleep in class, even if Prince Noctis is asleep and the teacher doesn’t say anything  
-Definitely don’t chase laser pointers  
_

After he starts working towards the goal of being Prince Noctis’ friend, he wants to be normal even more. No way the prince would want a weirdo as a friend. He can’t imagine him even wanting to be within ten feet of a Mr Moonie. So he reads his list carefully at least once a week. He sits on his hands when the teacher brings out the laser pointer. He makes a point of being wide-awake during all daytime hours, even to the point of being kind of hyper (he tried taking caffeine pills at one point in middle school, but that – uh, didn’t go well). He doesn’t scratch trees, or his desk, or the legs of his bed, or anything at all. He pretends really hard to be normal, and for a while, he kind of forgets that he isn’t.

Then, one day when he’s fourteen, he’s finally ready to meet the prince. He reads his list five times the night before and twice in the morning, because he absolutely doesn’t want to fuck up being Noctis’ friend at the first hurdle. He can barely concentrate in class, psyching himself up and twitching every time there’s an abrupt movement at the edge of his field of vision. And then: the moment comes. Noct’s walking across school grounds on his own, and Prompto swallows, plasters the biggest, brightest smile he can muster on his face, and heads over to him.

“Hey there, Prince Noctis,” he says, slapping Noct on the back. 

And somehow – it works. Noct doesn’t push him away. Doesn’t roll his eyes or look annoyed. He even smiles, kind of, and says something about their having met before, and slings an arm round his shoulders. 

He probably says something else, too, but Prompto is too busy concentrating on not purring to hear it.

~

Prompto meets Noct’s – meets Noct’s Ignis after he’s been friends with Noct for about a month. He hears about Noct’s Ignis when he’s been friends with Noct for about three hours, though. 

“I’ll get Ignis to pick us up,” Noct says, right after Prompto’s said he needs to get home. They’re at the arcade, where they’ve been since Prompto just strolled right on over to Noct and managed to make friends with him without doing anything weird. 

“Who’s Ignis?” Prompto asks. He thinks people with normal parents usually get picked up by their mom or dad. On the other hand, Noct’s dad is the king.

Shit. He’s been so focused on making friends with Noct that it hasn’t really struck him until now that Noct’s _dad_ is the _king_. Holy fuck. 

“He’s – Ignis,” Noct says, waving his hand like that explains everything. “Hang on, I’ll call him.” 

“No, man, I live nearby, I’ll just walk,” Prompto says. He’s feeling kind of sick with the tension of making sure he doesn’t do anything weird in front of the prince – in front of Noct, _his friend_ Noct – and he really doesn’t want to have to deal with having to not do anything weird in front of Noct’s – bodyguard or whatever. 

Noct objects, but Prompto is determined, and eventually Noct lets him go. As soon as he’s out of sight of the arcade, he finds the nearest tree and rubs his cheek against it. Shit. He’s really made friends with the prince. Fuck.

He runs round the tree three times, jumping on a slight movement in the grass that turns out to be an ant. Across the little park, a woman stares at him. He gets to his feet, leaving the ant to whatever it was doing before Prompto interrupted it, and tries to look normal. 

Four weeks later, he finally meets Ignis. By this time, he’s heard enough about him to know that _bodyguard_ isn’t the right description (actually, there’s another guy who’s theoretically Noct’s bodyguard, and Prompto’s definitely not looking forward to meeting him). Ignis is more like – a butler? Maybe? But when Prompto suggested that, Noct looked at him with round eyes.

“Oh, wow,” he said. “Definitely don’t call him that when you meet him.” 

Which is when Prompto finds out that he’s going to meet Ignis. And a few days later, there he is, standing outside the school waiting, leaning on the shiniest, sleekest, blackest car Prompto has ever seen. Prompto doesn’t know what Ignis looks like, but the moment he sees this guy with the car and the glasses and crisp, terrifyingly refined taste in clothing, he knows. This is Noct’s Ignis. 

The scary thing is, even though they’ve never met, Ignis apparently knows exactly what Prompto looks like. He stands up and comes over to him, the crowd of students parting before him like waves of grass. 

“Mr Argentum, I presume?” Ignis says. 

And that’s when Prompto discovers that Ignis – smells good. He smells so good. Prompto loves Noct, but Noct could really do with ditching whatever fucking terrible deodorant he uses and taking a leaf out of Ignis’ book. Ignis’ book smells gooooood. 

“Ah – excuse me,” Ignis says, and Prompto realises he’s right up close in Ignis’ space, sniffing Ignis. Noooooo fuck he’s sniffing Ignis, he hasn’t even exchanged a single word with the guy yet and he’s already fucking up. Fuck, Prompto has no fucking willpower. (Fuck, Ignis smells really good.)

“Uh,” Prompto says. “Sorry, I – dropped a – contact lens.” 

Ignis raises an eyebrow and looks at him closely. “You appear to be wearing one in each eye,” he says. “Which one did you drop?” 

Prompto opens his mouth and closes it again. “Uh – I – uh – I gotta go!” he says, and then literally runs in the other direction from Ignis and the car and Noct’s perfect life where nobody fucking _sniffs_ people they only just met. 

He hides behind the science building and watches as Noct appears and greets Ignis. A moment later, his phone rings.

“Hey, dude, where are you?” Noct says. “Ignis said you had to do something. I thought we were going to hang out?” 

“Um – something came up,” Prompto says. “I’m really sorry. Sorry, Noct.” 

There’s a pause. “Oh, OK,” Noct says. He sounds disappointed. He looks disappointed. “Are you – is everything OK?” 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s all fine!” Prompto says, uncomfortably aware that his voice is getting increasingly high-pitched. “I’ll see you tomorrow, k, bud?”

After that, he avoids any possibility of meeting Ignis again for several months, and hopes like hell that by the time they meet again, Ignis will have forgotten all about the sniffing thing. 

~

When they’ve been friends for about five months, Noct takes Prompto fishing. It’s a holiday, and a gorgeous one at that, the sky bright blue and the sun beating down. Prompto’s actually never been to the parts of Insomnia that aren’t just city, and when he hears Noct is planning a trip out to Lake Lucidus, he begs to be allowed to come along. He’s sure it’s so beautiful, and he wants to take pictures. And Noct probably looks super cool when he’s fishing, just like he looks super cool when he’s doing anything else. (Prompto didn’t realise that people under 50 went fishing, but he guesses it’s maybe some kind of elite high class thing.)

When Noct shows up, he’s not with Ignis, which would be a relief if it wasn’t for the fact that the guy he is with is huge and kinda terrifying. Not as terrifying as Ignis, but definitely still up there. 

“This your friend?” the huge guy asks, staring down at him. “Kinda a shrimp, ain’t he?” 

Prompto feels a spark of annoyance, but he also has the sudden urge to lie down on his back and show his belly to this guy. He clenches his teeth and forces himself to stay standing. 

“Prompto, Gladio, Gladio, Prompto,” Noct says. “You ready to go?” 

“Yep!” Prompto says. “All set.” He steps out of the house, closes the front door, and skirts carefully round Gladio to head out to the car the two of them arrived in. It’s a different shiny black car from the one he’s seen Ignis driving Noct around in before. There’s probably a whole parking garage full of shiny black cars back at the Citadel. One for every day of the year. He slides in the back seat and spends most of the journey concentrating hard on not scratching the leather upholstery. 

Prompto was right about the lake. It’s stunning, huge and blue and sparkling in the sun, the edges fringed with reeds and, further back, trees, sighing gently in the quiet breeze. Gladio promptly disappears into the woods, carrying what has to be the world’s biggest hunting knife. Noct sets up his fishing gear. Prompto crouches at the water’s edge and pats the surface with his palm. The sight of all that water is somehow both thrilling and terrifying. He catches sight of movement in the shallows and leaps at it, finding himself up to his elbows in water and with a tiny fish wriggling under his hands. 

“What’re you doing?” Noct calls. “You’ll get wet.” 

Prompto glances round at him, then looks down at himself. What _is_ he doing? He – caught a fish. But that’s not how you’re supposed to catch fish. Nobody catches fish by just – _jumping_ on them, even he knows that. 

Also, he’s wet. Ugh. _Ugh_. 

He stands up, letting the fish go and determinedly not watching the sharp movement of it as it escapes. He shakes off his hands one by one and then goes to sit by Noct on the jetty. He manages to restrain himself from jumping on Noct’s fishing line when he flings it back.

But only just.

~

Noct catches his first fish after about twenty minutes. It’s about ten times the size of the one Prompto caught, and Noct seems pretty happy. Prompto’s decided that fishing is – kinda boring, but Noct makes it look cool and watching the little fish swimming around under the jetty is mesmerising, so it’s all good. Noct’s fish lands on the jetty and starts flopping around and Prompto – can’t – help – himself – 

“Um, dude?” Noct says. “That’s my fish.” 

Prompto looks down at the fish that is currently twitching and gasping its last, pinned to the jetty by Prompto’s hands. He really wants to – bat the fish around a little. Maybe bite it. What would be _really_ satisfying is to pick it up in his mouth and present it to Noct so Noct could eat it. Yeah. He should do that. 

“Prompto?” Noct says. 

“Huh?” Prompto’s head snaps up. Oh yeah. Don’t be weird. That’s the rule, right? This is weird. He’s pretty sure this is weird. “Oh, uh – what do you want me to do with it?” 

“Just drop it in the bucket,” Noct says, gesturing. 

Prompto picks the fish up – with his hands, not with his mouth, haha, what kind of weirdo would pick a fish up with his mouth? – and drops it in the bucket. It’s still twitching a little, and he crouched beside the bucket and stares at it. 

“What are you going to do with it?” he asks. “Are you going to eat it?” He really wants Noct to eat it. He kinda wants to eat it himself, right now, but he’s not going to because he’s a perfectly normal human being. 

“I’ll take it back for Ignis,” Noct says. “He always appreciates a fresh catch.” 

Prompto imagines Ignis eating the fish, tearing into it with his teeth while it’s still twitching, scales going everywhere. 

“Hey Prompto,” says Gladio. Apparently Gladio is here and Prompto didn’t even notice. Prompto looks round at him. Gladio smirks. “Got a little drool thing going on,” he says, touching his chin.

Prompto closes his mouth with a snap and wipes his chin hurriedly. He looks back to find Noct staring at him. 

Fuck, he loves fishing. It’s amazing.

He never wants to go again.

~

When Prompto arrives at the arcade, Noct’s already there waiting. That’s not unusual. What is unusual is that he’s not alone. Specifically, he’s with a cat. The cat is large, black and white, and Noct is crouched on the sidewalk trying to interest it – him, Prompto knows somehow that it’s a him – in a piece of his sandwich. 

The thing is, it’s not the Prompto doesn’t like cats. He does! Kind of. Some cats. Like, some cats he really likes and wants to snuggle with and cuddle and all the normal shit that most people feel about cats. But then, there’s these other cats. Prompto doesn’t like the other cats, and they don’t like him. Just the way they smell makes him weirdly angry, especially if they’re close to his house. Or, apparently, to Noctis. 

“What’s that?” Prompto says. His tone sounds – kind of aggressive. He doesn’t usually talk that way to Noct. He doesn’t usually talk that way to _anyone_. He hopes Noct hasn’t noticed, but from the confused expression Noct has when he looks up and sees who it is, he thinks he probably has. 

“Hey, Prompto,” Noct says, turning back to the cat. “You got anything I can feed this guy? He’s kinda shy.” 

Prompto stares at the cat. The cat stares at him. The cat is not _shy_. The cat is an _asshole_ , and why the fuck is Noct even feeding him? Noct should be feeding Prompto. This cat should fuck the hell off.

The cat arches its back and starts to make a low growling noise. Prompto finds himself making a similar noise, deep in his throat, but manages to cut it off pretty quickly. He’s pretty sure Noct didn’t notice. Noct is too focused on the cat. 

“Hey, buddy,” Noct says, reaching out and trying to pet the cat. “What’s the matter? Did you see another cat?” He glances around and frowns, then tries again to pet the cat. The cat swipes at his hand with a paw, claws out. Prompto bites his tongue. He really wants to – slap the cat. 

Why the fuck does he want to slap a _cat_?

“Hey, so, can we go inside?” he says. It’s difficult to say it because first he has to unclench his jaw, and his tone is _definitely_ snappish. “It’s – loud out here.” 

Noct looks back at him. “Huh?” he says. “Not as loud as it will be in the arcade.” He frowns. “Are you OK? Have I done something to piss you off?” 

“Just—” Prompto says. He clenches his hands into fists, releases them, clenches them again. “I really – want to go inside.” Things are getting out of control. He has to get away from this stupid cat before he does something weird enough that Noct will definitely notice. 

Noct’s frown deepens. Then he glances back once at the cat, which is still growling at Prompto, and stands up. 

“OK, buddy,” he says. He puts a hand on Prompto’s back and makes this kind of soothing, petting motion that Prompto thinks should be weird but feels so damn good that he doesn’t care. “Let’s go inside.” 

They go inside, and suddenly everything’s – better. They play some stupid shoot-em-up and Prompto kills a whole lot of bad guys as viciously as he can, and that helps a lot. The problem is, though, Noct still smells like the cat. It’s not too bad, but every now and then Noct will move in a particular way and Prompto will catch a whiff of it and he’ll be on edge all over again. He really, _really_ wants to lick Noct until the smell goes away, but that is definitely not a thing he is going to do, or even think about doing, or even have the idea to do ever ever ever. Plus, Noct keeps shooting him these glances that make him think that Noct _definitely_ noticed how weird he was being with the cat. Fuck, why can’t he just be a normal person? 

“Hey, you wanna eat something?” Noct says.

“Yeah,” Prompto says, and then, without even thinking about it, “Can I have a bite of your sandwich?” 

“Huh?” Noct says. The forgotten, half-eaten sandwich is sticking out of his messenger bag. “Um – sure, if you want.” He tears off a piece and holds it out to Prompto. Prompto takes it, shoves it in his mouth, and has a sudden sense of victory that no amount of _you are being really weird right now_ can completely dispel. 

Noct’s looking at him with an unreadable expression. Then he holds out the rest of the sandwich. “Here, you can have it if you want.” 

“Thanks, bud,” Prompto says. “I’m – uh – pretty starved.” He takes the sandwich and tries to eat it as nonchalantly as he can. That’s normal, right? There’s no point letting a perfectly good sandwich go to waste. And if he feels way happier about being given a soggy tuna melt sub than anyone really should, well, no-one knows that except him, so it’s all fine. 

Later on, when they leave the arcade, he sees the cat still lurking in an alleyway. He throws an arm round Noct’s shoulders and steers him in the other direction. The cat hisses at him. Prompto doesn’t hiss back.

But he does stick out his tongue.

~

After Prompto has been Noct’s friend for a couple of years, he looks at his list of things not to do and realises that it’s getting really long: 

_-Don’t sniff people  
-Especially don’t sniff Ignis  
-...or at least, don’t let Ignis catch you sniffing him  
-Don’t lick people  
-Definitely don’t lick Noct  
-Don’t chew on Noct, either  
-Don’t do anything to Noct with your mouth  
-Don’t do weird stuff in front of Gladio, he’ll make a thing out of it  
-Try and avoid cats  
-Don’t go fishing with Noct  
-Don’t sit on the counter when Ignis is around  
_

The counter thing has only become a problem recently, since Noct moved into his new apartment. Before that, Noct and Prompto mostly met up at the arcade or at the movies or whatever (and Prompto learned a long time ago that sitting up on the back of his chair at the movies was going to make him seriously unpopular). Prompto never really wanted to go visit Noct at the Citadel (because fuck, terrifying, the _King_ hangs out there, not to mention _Cor the Immortal_ ), and Prompto definitely wasn’t going to invite a literal actual prince to his mediocre suburban house, so there just – weren’t any counters to worry about. Not that Prompto would have worried anyway, because he had no idea that sitting on counters was a bad thing. His parents never seemed to care, and they were the only people whose counter he had access to. So – yeah. He didn’t know it was a problem.

And the thing is, it doesn’t even seem to be a problem in Noct’s apartment. The first time Prompto goes over there after helping Noct move in, he sits up on the counter like he does at home and Noct doesn’t seem to give a shit. It’s cool. It’s a seriously great apartment, and from up on the counter Prompto not only gets a good vantage point on the entire living room, he also gets to take full advantage of the view out of the floor-to-ceiling windows. There are seriously no downsides. 

Well, there is one downside. That downside makes itself known the day Prompto breezes into Noct’s apartment to find Ignis cooking. It smells – _amazing_ (not to mention Ignis smells amazing, because, well, Ignis), and Prompto wants to get as close as he can so he can watch what’s going on and get the full effect of the smell, so he moves the chopping board out of the way and hops up on the counter next to the stove, peering into the saucepan that Ignis is busy stirring. He opens his mouth to ask Ignis what it is, but then all the words go out of his head when he sees the look Ignis is giving him.

“What are you doing?” Ignis asks. He sounds – kind of pissed off. And that’s weird, because usually Ignis is pretty good at tolerating Prompto. Sometimes Prompto even thinks maybe Iggy kind of likes him. Also, of all the people in the world, Ignis Scientia is the absolute last one Prompto wants to piss off. He really likes him, but the man is terrifying.

“Uh—” Prompto says. Did he sniff Ignis? He doesn’t think he sniffed Ignis. What else could he have done to annoy him? Shit, knowing him it could be any number of things. 

“Get off the counter,” Ignis says. 

Prompto hurriedly gets down without really thinking about what Ignis said. Ignis continues to stare at him, one eyebrow raised. 

“Um – sorry?” Prompto says at last. He’s not really sure why sitting on the counter is suddenly such a big deal, but he’s definitely sorry. 

Ignis nods and then quickly and thoroughly cleans the counter. Prompto itches to jump in and do it for him so he can somehow redeem himself, but at the same time he definitely does not want to get in Iggy’s way right now, so he slinks off to the couch as quietly as possible. Noct is there, dozing across half the seat, and Prompto sits up on the back of the couch next to him. After a couple of minutes, he looks up to see Ignis staring at him with a slight frown on his face. 

“Uh… am I OK to sit here?” Prompto asks. Maybe there’s some kind of unspoken rule about sitting on the back of the couch, too. He used to get yelled at at school for sitting on the desks and the backs of the chairs until he trained himself out of doing it, but he always thought that was just a weird school thing, like having to wear a uniform. But… maybe not? 

“I’d rather you--” Ignis starts, and then seems to shake himself. “It’s fine.” 

“OK,” Prompto says. He kind of feels like it isn’t fine, though, so he slips down to sit on the couch seat instead. It’s definitely not as good down here – the view is nowhere near as good – but at least he knows this is definitely allowed. Seems like being royal is kind of like being in school all the time. No wonder Noct gets so tired.

~

So: Prompto trains himself not to get up on the counter at Noct’s apartment. At first he thinks maybe he can just not do it when Iggy is around, since Noct himself doesn’t seem to care, but then sometimes Iggy just walks in when he’s chilling up there and no matter how fast he throws himself off, it’s never fast enough. Ignis doesn’t yell at him again, but he does sigh and push his glasses up his nose and say things like _it’s unhygienic_ , and eventually Prompto just stops doing it altogether. It’s not that big of a deal, really. Sitting on the couch is fine. 

A few months later, Noct gets a new coffee table delivered to his apartment. It comes in this big cardboard box, and once the table is all set up and covered in snacks and Noct and Prompto are ready to play a round of video games, Prompto waits to see if Noct wants to get into the box and, when he doesn’t, gets in it himself. 

Noct looks over at him and raises his eyebrows.

“Oh, did you want the box?” Prompto says, putting down his controller, and starting to get out. 

“Um—” Noct says, but then he shakes his head. “No, man, you have the box.” 

Prompto nods and settles into the box. It’s a long time since he’s had a box to sit in – he grew out of the ones his parents had at home years ago. This one’s perfect – the right size, sides low enough for him to hold the controller without any problems, but high enough that if he curls up in it he won’t stick out too much. He’s surprised Noct didn’t want it, but he’s not going to argue, not when it means he gets to sit in the box. 

Some time later, Gladio arrives. He stares at Prompto with a weird expression on his face. 

“Sitting in a box, huh?” he says at last. 

Prompto wonders if Gladio wants the box. But no – it’s too small for Gladio. It must be hard, being too big to fit even coffee-table-sized boxes. 

“Yup,” he says. 

Gladio laughs for some reason, then goes over to raid the fridge. 

Ignis shows up an hour or so after that. Noct and Prompto are still busy killing monsters. Gladio’s on the other end of the couch from Noct, buried in a book, but he looks up when Ignis comes in, like he’s expecting something. 

Ignis pauses in the doorway, staring at Prompto. Prompto starts to feel like maybe he did something wrong with the whole box thing, even though he offered it to Noct. Maybe there’s some kind of royal protocol, where Noct’s supposed to decline and he’s supposed to offer it again? It’s kinda weird that Noct didn’t want to sit in it, but Noct can be a little weird sometimes, so he didn’t think it was such a big deal. 

“Iggy?” he says. He definitely doesn’t want to make Ignis mad again. “Um – everything OK?” 

Ignis blinks. “Everything is perfectly fine,” he says. He glances at Gladio – who’s grinning for some reason – and then goes to the kitchen and starts getting out ingredients for dinner. 

OK. So – everything’s fine. Maybe. Probably. Whatever. Iggy’s not mad – Prompto would definitely be able to tell if he was mad – and that’s all that matters. 

The next day, he arrives at Noct’s apartment to find the box is still there, and for some reason Noct is sitting on the couch instead of in the box. Maybe Noct doesn’t like sitting in boxes? Prompto thought everyone liked sitting in boxes. He hesitates. But come on, if Noct doesn’t even want it--

“Hey, so, the box…?” he says. 

Noct glances at it, then at him. “Oh, yeah,” he says. “Specs said he was gonna take it to the recycling but – I don’t know, I guess he didn’t get around to it.” 

Prompto nods. “So you don’t want it?” he says.

Noct frowns slightly. “I mean, it’s just a box,” he says. 

“Right!” Prompto says. He guesses if you’re the prince then you can just get a human-sized box any time you want to. Not that Noct does particularly seem to want to. But Prompto’s not going to complain about that. He’s just going to sit in the box until someone tells him not to. 

~

Ignis never does get rid of the box. Instead, he puts a couple of cushions in it. After it’s been sitting in the corner of Noct’s living room for a couple of months, Iris decorates it with flowers and rainbows and a giant PROMPTO in sparkly purple letters. Gladio seems to think this is hilarious.

Prompto kind of thinks it’s great.

~

Ignis is an amazing cook. Prompto thinks maybe Ignis is the best cook in Lucis. Maybe on Eos. The best thing, the absolute best, is when Noct goes fishing (without Prompto) and then Ignis cooks the fish. He’s never tasted anything so good. He could just eat it forever. 

“Prompto, are you – purring?” Ignis asks. 

A fishbone gets stuck in Prompto’s throat. He coughs, then coughs some more. “What?” he says, eyes watering. “Huh?” 

Gladio thumps him on the back. Noct looks worried. Ignis looks like he’s poised to perform the Domicilium manoeuvre if necessary. Everyone’s staring at him. But at least they’re staring at him because he’s choking, not because he’s _purring_. 

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Prompto says, gulping the water that Noct hands him. “Just – something went down the wrong way.” 

He lets Noct have the rest of his fish in exchange for Noct’s vegetables, even though Prompto doesn’t even like vegetables that much. At least that means he’s unlikely to accidentally purr while eating them. Ignis glares at him, but that’s OK. There are worse things he could be glared at for. 

~

“Windy today, huh?” Gladio says. 

Prompto pauses in his steps and looks round at him. “Huh?” he says. 

Gladio shrugs. “You’re always weird when it’s windy,” he says. He waves a hand without looking up from his book. “You know. Antsy.” 

Prompto suddenly becomes aware that he’s been – pacing. But that’s – that’s not super weird, right? What he _wants_ to do is tear around Noct’s apartment as fast as he can until some of the twisted-up energy that’s taken over his whole body gets spent. But he knows that’s weird – it’s on his list – so he’s just pacing instead. Normal people pace. Pacing is totally normal. 

“I’m not weird,” he says, and manages not to follow it with _I am a totally normal human being_. 

Gladio smirks. “Keep telling yourself that, buddy,” he says. 

Prompto sits down in his box. He sits on his hands. The energy inside him twists tighter and tighter, but he clenches his jaw and ignores it. 

He is not weird. Or at least, he can probably manage to only be weird on the inside, if he tries hard enough.

Probably.

~

“I wonder if I might ask you something,” Ignis says to him one day when Noct’s napping and Gladio is out somewhere else, probably benchpressing a catoblepas or something. 

“Huh?” Prompto says, looking up from his phone. “Sure, fire away.” 

Ignis comes and sits down opposite him. He clears his throat. “It’s rather… delicate.” 

“Oh, huh,” Prompto says. He puts the phone down and tries to look serious and dignified. 

Ignis frowns at him. “Are you quite all right?” he says.

OK, maybe _dignified_ was a bit of a stretch. “What’s on your mind, Iggy?” 

Ignis clears his throat again. “Of course, you don’t have to divulge any information unless you choose, but--” He folds his hands. “I wondered if you had ever been – tested for anything.”

Prompto is attacked by a brief coughing fit. “Uh,” he says, eyes watering. “Um, what?” 

“I apologise,” Ignis says, magically producing a glass of water out of thin air. “I don’t mean to pry, but--” 

“Iggy,” Prompto says. He shakes his head, aware from how his face is burning that he must be an impressive shade of red right now. “I – is it – is that, like – a thing where I don’t get to hang out with Noct if I--” 

“Oh, no, certainly not,” Ignis says. “No, Prompto, I just thought – it might be easier for you if we knew any details--” 

Prompto really doesn’t get why it would be easier for him, but on the other hand, he doesn’t have anything embarrassing to hide, so – well, OK, that’s not true, it’s kind of embarrassing, but--

“Um, I--” he says. “I mean – Iggy, I haven’t even--” He lowers his voice. “I haven’t, um – you know, _done it_ with anyone yet so--” 

Ignis stares at him. Prompto chews his lip. Fuck, he really didn’t think this day was going to include Ignis interrogating him about his sex life. 

“But I – but when I do I’ll get tested,” he says. “You know. Better safe than sorry, and stuff.” 

Ignis stares for a moment longer. Then he coughs. “That wasn’t exactly what I--” he starts, and then shakes his head. “Well. It doesn’t matter.”

Prompto nods, hoping this conversation is going to end soon. Like, in the next five seconds would be good. And for once, the gods are smiling. 

“I should – get on,” Ignis says, rising to his feet. “I do apologise for prying.” 

“Yeah, no probs,” Prompto says. It hadn’t occurred to him before that it might be Ignis’ job to check none of Noct’s friends have STDs, but it makes a weird kind of sense. He wouldn’t want to accidentally infect Noct with something by licking him or whatever. Not that he would ever lick Noct. Not that he would ever lick Noct _again_. 

Prompto scrubs a hand over his face and goes back to his phone.

~

Prompto arrives at Noct’s apartment in a good mood. It’s a beautiful day, he managed a nap on the windowsill in his house before leaving for Noct’s, and he’s feeling refreshed and ready for some serious brocialising. He raises his hand to knock on the door and pauses, suddenly catching his name in the murmur of voices from inside. He frowns and inclines his head towards the door, picking the voices apart. Ignis, Noct and Gladio.

“I’m just saying, there’s gotta be something,” Gladio is saying. 

“I don’t know for sure, but it’s my impression his parents never had him tested for anything,” Ignis replies. “Although my research hasn’t turned up any disorders that fit--” 

“Prompto doesn’t have a _disorder_ ,” Noct says. He sounds – kinda pissed. “He’s just weird.”

Prompto steps back from the door. Him. They’re talking about him. He puts a hand over his mouth.

“It could be some kind of reaction to trauma,” Ignis is saying. Prompto swallows a hysterical laugh. _Trauma?_ Nothing traumatic has ever happened to him, unless you count what’s going on right now. The most traumatic thing in his life is the weird recurring nightmare he has where someone’s holding him down and cutting off his ears, but that’s just a dream. Everyone gets weird dreams, right? That’s normal, right? 

“Look, I’m telling you--” Noct says, and Prompto turns and runs back down the hallway, taking care to be as silent as he can, because he doesn’t want to hear Noct say how weird he is again. He almost trips on the stairs – he’s so fucking clumsy – and by the time he gets outside, his heart’s pounding in his ears. He stumbles on for a few blocks, then sinks down into the doorway of a closed store. 

Fuck. He thought – he thought he was doing OK. Yeah, he’s slipped up a couple of times – maybe more than a couple – but he really thought Noct at least just thought he was a normal, fun friend guy, not – not someone weird. He doesn’t want to be weird. All he’s ever wanted is to be normal. 

He sits for a while, trying to get his breath back under control. Then he heads back home. He gets out his list and reads it. He reads it again. He underlines some things. He wonders if it’s possible to get it tattooed on the insides of his eyelids. 

His phone buzzes. It’s Noct.

_Noct: Hey, dude, I thought you were coming over?_

_Noct: Specs made sushi_

Prompto chews his lip. It’s OK. It’s all right. Just because Noct thinks he’s weird and Ignis thinks maybe he’s a mental case and Gladio – well, Gladio’s never really hidden what he thinks about Prompto – just because of that doesn’t mean – it doesn’t mean he can’t still be friends with them. He just has to – he just has to try harder. He never had to try this hard before he had friends, but now--

Now he has to try harder. He swallows, reads the list again, then picks up his phone. 

_Prompto: Sorry, man! Got caught up in something_

_Prompto: I’ll be there in twenty_

He puts his phone in his pocket and takes a deep breath, then practices plastering on a smile.

It’s fine.


	2. Cat on a hot tin roof

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys! Thank you for all your lovely feedback and I must inform you that Thwippersnapple has drawn an [absolutely delightful picture](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1279869576000311296/photo/1) of Prompto in his box. Catboy is very happy! Noct is... confused but OK with it! D'awwww. Please go and enjoy and give the artist some love!
> 
> Hope you enjoy this continuation ♥
> 
> PS I am having some trouble with AO3, so apologies to anyone who saw this chapter appear and then disappear!

The next couple of weeks are – difficult. Prompto’s hyper-aware of everything he’s doing, and every reaction that Noct or Ignis or Gladio has to everything he’s doing, and he can’t help noticing that – they’re noticing him. He’s trying really hard not to do anything weird, and he thinks he’s even succeeding, but they still keep – _looking_ at him like he actually is being weird. Like – are there maybe some weird things that he’s doing that he doesn’t even know about? How can he find out about them? He can’t exactly ask any of his friends, because that’ll just make it even more noticeable that he doesn’t know how the fuck to be a real normal person. So he just grins a lot and is extra enthusiastic about everything and holds himself very still as much as he can and thinks very carefully about every single thing that he does before doing it. 

“Um, Prompto?” Noct says. 

Prompto turns to look at him, smiling as wide as he can manage. “Yeah, buddy?” he says. Ignis is dusting and Prompto’s been so busy focusing on not reacting to the constant, flickering motion in his peripheral vision that he has no idea whether it’s the first time Noct has tried to get his attention or not. 

“You’re, uh – you’re bleeding,” Noct says. He looks worried. 

“Huh?” Prompto puts his hand to his mouth and realises that Noct’s right. Shit. He’s been biting the inside of his cheek so hard that he’s drawn blood. “Oh! Uh – oops.” He tries to think of an explanation. Ignis has stopped dusting and is staring at him. “You know me,” Prompto says. “Cl-- uh, clumsy.” He grins, then quickly stops grinning when he realises that he probably has blood on his teeth. Great. Another tick in the _possible mental disorder_ box. 

Noct’s still frowning at him. After a moment, he takes a deep breath, like he’s about to say something. But he doesn’t say anything. He just lets the breath out after a couple of seconds. 

“Maybe, um – be more careful?” he says. 

“You got it!” says Prompto. 

Everyone stares at him. Prompto sits as still as he can. 

Fuck. 

~

The thing is, it’s not the first time Noct has acted like he has something important to say to Prompto and then not said it. He – keeps doing it, ever since that conversation that Prompto overheard. Every time he does it, Prompto gets more and more sure about what it is. They’re nearly done with school, and Noct’s going to be doing more and more prince stuff, and Noct thinks Prompto is weird, and Ignis thinks Prompto is mentally ill, and Noct’s getting ready to tell Prompto that they probably shouldn’t hang out so much any more. Or maybe that they shouldn’t hang out at all. But Noct’s a good guy, and he doesn’t want to hurt Prompto’s feelings, so he’s having to work himself up to it. 

Fuck. Prompto doesn’t know what he’s going to do if – when – if Noct tells him to take a hike. It’s not until the possibility starts looming larger and larger in his mind that he realises how much of his life revolves round Noct. Like – maybe all of it? Does he even have a life outside Noct? Shit, what kind of person doesn’t have a life outside their BFF? Prompto is such a fuck up. 

But maybe – maybe he can stave off the inevitable. Like, if he can convince Noct – especially if he can convince Ignis – that actually he doesn’t have a mental disorder, that the last four years have just been – him goofing around or something, then maybe--

But the thing is, Prompto’s not sure he can try harder than he already is. At night, he falls into bed exhausted from the constant effort. And it doesn’t seem to be working. Noct keeps shooting him these worried looks. Ignis does a lot of sighing in his general direction. Even Gladio’s started looking concerned – not all the time, but even once is a giant flashing red light when it comes to Gladio. Somehow, despite the fact that he’s trying harder than ever, he’s making things worse. He starts to feel like he’s on the brink of a panic attack approximately fifty percent of the time. And Noct – Noct just keeps doing that thing where he’s about to ask Prompto something and then he doesn’t, and Prompto thinks maybe he’s going to lose his mind.

About ten days after Prompto overhears the conversation about what a fucking weirdo he is, Noct texts him.

_Noct: Hey, can you come over? I gotta talk to you about something._

And there it is. Prompto stares at the text for way too long before answering. Long enough for his vision to get kind of blurry. Finally, he swipes at his eyes and taps out a response. 

_Prompto: Sure thing! Be there asap_

He shoves his phone in his pocket and takes a deep breath. OK, fine. Here it is. In some ways, it’s a relief. At least now he’ll know. 

Better to get it over with fast. So he’ll – run to Noct’s apartment building. 

He’ll run.

~

Outside, it’s raining. Well, maybe _raining_ isn’t really the right word. It’s more like a solid wall of water. Prompto _hates_ rain. He hates getting wet. He especially hates his hair getting wet. But within five minutes of going outside, he’s absolutely soaked. By the time he reaches Noct’s apartment, he can’t even remember what it feels like to be dry. Ugh, ugh ugh _ugh_ , fuck, he hates his life, why does _everything_ have to be so fucking _terrible_ \--

Noct opens the door. Prompto twists his face into a smile, trying to stop his teeth from chattering. He tries to stand up straight, but he can’t quite stop himself from curling over, shoulders hunched, hands wedged under his armpits. He knows his hair looks terrible. Because the universe couldn’t just let him have this one, awful conversation while looking at least a little bit dignified. 

“Morning!” he says. 

“Holy shit, Prompto,” Noct says, then grabs him by the shoulder and physically hauls him into the apartment. “Fuck, Ignis! I need a towel!” 

Ignis appears almost instantly, holding the world’s fluffiest, whitest towel and staring at Prompto in disapproval. “You could have waited to come over until it stopped,” he says. 

Prompto tries to suppress a sneeze. “Um, Noct said he needed to talk to me,” he says. 

“Yeah, but--” Noct says. Then he shakes his head and grabs the towel, scrubbing viciously at Prompto’s hair. “Dude, you hate getting wet,” he mutters. “You could have just said.” 

Prompto – kind of wants to curl up into the towel and let Noct dry him off, because damn, it feels _really_ good. But actually what he wants to do is get this conversation over with and go home and hide under his bed and never come out again. 

“So – I mean, what was it you wanted to talk to me about?” he says, proud of himself for getting it out without his voice wavering. 

Noct abruptly stops towelling. He swallows, subsiding onto the couch next to Prompto. Prompto steels himself. 

“I, uh--” Noct says, avoiding Prompto’s eyes. “It’s – maybe we can talk about it later, when you’re--”

“He wants you to join the Crownsguard so he can order you round for the rest of your life,” Gladio says. 

“ _Gladio_ ,” Noct hisses. 

Gladio shrugs. “Some of us don’t have time to wait around all day while you get over yourself, princess.” 

“What?” Prompto says, staring at Gladio. Then he turns to stare at Noct. “What?” 

Noct shakes his head. “Listen, I know you’ve got – you want to do photography, but you could still do that in your spare time and I – I know it’s not really what you planned, but--” 

“But you’re always telling me I suck at fighting,” Prompto says to Gladio. Gladio’s been trying to teach Prompto self-defence ever since Prompto started hanging out with Noct, and Gladio is _always_ telling Prompto he sucks at fighting. 

Gladio shrugs again. “Sure, you’re kinda puny, not to mention clumsy as hell and way too easily distracted,” he says. “But you’ve got killer reflexes and no matter how hard you go down, you always land on your feet, so it’ll probably work out.” 

Prompto blinks at him. Then he blinks at Ignis. Ignis thinks he’s mentally ill. Shit, maybe he _is_ mentally ill. But Ignis just nods at him.

“The paperwork’s already approved,” he says. “Although you’ll still have to pass the entrance exam.” 

Prompto stares. Then he turns to Noct. Noct thinks he’s weird. Noct doesn’t want to be friends with him any more, what with how weird he is. No – wait. Noct didn’t say that. Noct said something completely different.

“Would we still – hang out?” Prompto asks. 

Noct gives him a weird look. “Um, duh,” he says. “That’s kinda the whole point, dumbass.” Then he hunches his shoulders slightly and looks away. “I mean – only if you want to, though. I know it’s a big thing to ask.” 

“Dude,” Prompto whispers. 

Noct’s shoulders hunch a little more. 

“Um – entrance exam?” Prompto says, turning back to Ignis. 

“We’ll assist you with your preparation,” Ignis says. “If you decide to accept His Highness’s request.” 

“Accept?” Prompto says. He frowns. “Wait – didn’t I already accept?” He looks at Noct. “I mean – you thought there was any chance I was going to say no?” Noct thinks he’s weird, Noct thinks he’s weird and he still wants him to be a member of his Crownsguard. The actual Crownsguard. Prompto’s never wanted to say no to anything less in his life. 

Noct’s head lifts. His shoulders unhunch. “I mean – yeah? Maybe?” he says. “You’ve been – you’ve been so stressed lately, I didn’t want to drop something else on you, but if you’re gonna take the exam this year you’re gonna need to start prepping asap, so—” 

“Stressed?” Prompto says. “I haven’t been stressed. I’m fine.” 

There’s a silence. Prompto looks round to see all three of them are staring at him. Then Gladio snorts. 

“So what’s all this about, then?” he says, and then sits up in an alert posture, absolutely still, and twists his face into a terrifyingly manic smile. 

Prompto stares at him. “What?” he says. 

Ignis comes and sits down next to him. “You don’t have to tell us what’s going on, but if there’s anything we can help with – you should know we have access to considerable resources.” 

“What?” Prompto says again. He feels like nothing’s making much sense right now, but maybe that’s because he thinks he might be about to pass out from relief. But one thing is clear: Noct doesn’t want to ditch him. Noct wants to pull him even closer into his orbit. And Prompto – Prompto is totally fine with that. 

“So, yeah,” he says, fighting the urge to crawl into Noct’s lap and purr as loud as he can and punching Noct in the arm as a substitute. “Crownsguard, huh? Sounds cool. I’m gonna look pretty dang hot in that uniform.” 

Gladio snorts.

“Excellent,” says Ignis. “I’ll draw up the necessary arrangements and get hold of the preliminary questionnaires for your physical and psychological assessments.” 

“Awesome,” Prompto says, smiling a genuine smile for the first time in over a week. “Thanks, Iggy!” Then he hears what Ignis actually said. In particular, the words _psychological assessment._

Well, crap.

~

The months leading up to the Crownsguard exam are the busiest Prompto’s ever been. There’s still school to worry about, and his job, and then every spare minute that he’s not doing either of those things (and some minutes when he is), he’s training with Gladio or studying with Ignis. He’s lost count of how many bruises he has (which he wouldn’t have if he wasn’t so clumsy, as Gladio keeps reminding him), his brain aches all the time, he barely gets to see Noct, and he’s seriously starting to rethink the whole idea of joining the Crownsguard. Not to mention, remembering to be normal literally all the time is exhausting. Aside from when he’s sleeping, there are almost no minutes in the day when he’s alone and can just not worry about it too much, and he’s starting to feel like maybe he’s going to lose his mind. 

The day before the exam, he’s just hauling his battered body down the stairs to head to the Citadel for one last round of training when someone knocks on the door. Prompto opens it and finds Noctis standing on the doorstep. Prince Noctis, the actual Crown Prince of Lucis, just hanging out on his suburban doorstep on his own like that’s totally OK. 

“Uh – Noct?” Prompto says. He looks around for Iggy or Gladio or a big shiny black car, but there’s nothing. Just Noct. 

“Arcade?” Noct says. 

“Huh?” Prompto’s aware that his mouth is hanging open a little, but he’s – just kinda really surprised. And also wiped out. 

“Yeah,” Noct says. He grabs his arm. “Come on. I need to beat your ass at Justice Monsters V.” 

“Huh?” Prompto says again, then, “I’ve got training.” 

“Nope. No point in training this close to the exam. Today’s your day off.” 

_Day off_. The words sound like an impossible dream. Prompto imagines a day where he could just sleep, curled up in his box at Noct’s apartment. Maybe laze around and watch Noct fish. Maybe go the arcade. 

Huh. They seem to be going to the arcade. They’re halfway down the street, and Prompto doesn’t even remember leaving the house. Did he close the front door? He hopes he closed the front door. 

“Uh – how did you get here?” he asks. “Where’s Iggy?” 

“I took the subway,” Noct says. “I don’t know where he is, reading some reports or something. He told me not to bother him unless it was urgent.” 

“Subway?” Prompto says. They’re actually almost at the subway right now. Mr Moonie is sitting outside the subway station, like always. Oh, crap, that means Noct had to pass Mr Moonie when he arrived. Noct’s been to Prompto’s neighbourhood before, but only ever in the car, to pick up Prompto or drop him off. Prompto really doesn’t want Noct to see Mr Moonie. 

“Prince of Lucis!” Mr Moonie yells suddenly, when they’re still twenty metres away. He points accusingly at Noct. Everyone on the street just ignores him, like always, but Prompto feels his stomach turn over. 

“Noct,” he says, tugging Noct’s arm. “Let’s go to a different subway station.” 

“Huh?” Noct says. “Why?” 

“Because – uh, that weird guy,” Prompto says. He doesn’t want Noct to know that he knows Mr Moonie’s name, or that he has anything to do with Mr Moonie at all. 

Noct follows his gaze. “So there’s a weird guy,” he says. “What’s the big deal?” 

They’re almost on top of Mr Moonie now, and Mr Moonie glares at Noct, then at Prompto. Then he makes this loud meowing noise. It’s something he does pretty much any time Prompto comes near him. Prompto flushes, wishing desperately that Noct had come in the car.

“Hey,” Noct says. He puts his hand in his pocket and pulls out a ten-crown note, dropping it in Mr Moonie’s change cup. “There’s a Crown Shelter a couple blocks away. No charge.” 

Mr Moonie grins a toothless grin at him. “Go there yourself, you like crowns,” he says. 

Noct nods. “OK,” he says. He heads into the subway station, and Prompto hurries after him.

“Noct, why’d you talk to him?” he hisses. 

Noct turns and frowns at him. “Why wouldn’t I talk to him?” 

“Because—” Prompto’s thoughts are muddled. He’s so tired. Mr Moonie’s always been someone he’s hurried past, trying to ignore the meowing, avoiding his eye. “He’s – weird.” 

Noct’s frown deepens. “It’s not like he can help it,” he says. “Anyway, what’s the big deal about being weird? That’s kinda judgemental.” 

Prompto gapes at him. Judgemental? But – Mr Moonie’s weird! It’s not OK to be weird. Nobody likes weird people. 

“Are we going to the arcade, or what?” Noct says. 

So they go to the arcade.

~

The Crownsguard exam is, hands-down, the worst experience of Prompto’s life, with the one exception being the day he overheard Noct, Ignis and Gladio talking about how weird he is. It starts with an actual, pencil-and-paper exam, then there’s a second one which he’s pretty sure is the psychological assessment because the questions it asks are all really strange. Then he has to go and get weighed, measured, have his blood and eyesight tested, all that jazz. And then, when he’s already exhausted and it’s only late morning, the actual physical exam begins. 

Prompto – sucks. He falls off the balance beam three times. He absolutely fails to knock down his opponent in sparring. He’s good at the target shooting and rope climbing, and he gets a pretty decent score in both sprinting and longer-distance running, but when it comes to the grand finale, when they all have laser shooters and are supposed to eliminate each other, he gets so distracted by the red spots of light that are dancing everywhere that he’s one of the first out. He sits on the bench at the side of the gym and closes his eyes. Noct’s gonna be so disappointed. Ignis is going to sigh and Gladio’s going to say he knew it all along and Noct – Noct’s gonna be so disappointed. 

The exercise ends. Prompto hunches his shoulders. At least he can go home and sleep. The whole thing started at 8.30 am and now it’s after six and he is so. Tired. 

Except apparently, it’s not over. Moments after the last man standing is declared the winner of the final exercise, Marshal Leonis – freaking _Cor_ the freaking _Immortal_ – strides into the room. 

“Crownsguard candidates,” he says. He’s not even raising his voice, but somehow it rings out loud and clear. The man is just that fucking cool. “Prepare for the final test.” 

Wait – final test? Prompto thought they just had the final test. Shit, there’s more? 

“Follow your assigned group leader to the transportation stations,” Marshal Leonis says. Then he just walks out without another word. Because he’s just that fucking cool. 

Prompto hauls himself off the bench and goes to stand with the group he’s been assigned to all day. The other candidates mostly ignore him, but one or two give him pitying looks. At least Noct isn’t here to witness his failure. Fuck. 

The group leader takes them outside and ushers them into a black van. They drive for some distance, but there are no windows so Prompto doesn’t know where exactly they’re going. By the time they get out of the van, night’s fallen. And they’re – somewhere with no lights. The city’s not far away, the lights of the streets and buildings visible through the trees, but here it’s darker than Prompto’s ever experienced. It’s – kinda cool. 

“Your mission,” says Marshal Leonis, Cor the Freaking Immortal, who’s just appeared out of nowhere like a fucking ninja, “is to find three magical objects without being caught by enemy soldiers and make it to the assigned rendezvous point. Questions?” 

Prompto stares at him. That’s – not a lot of information to go on. 

“Sir, what do the objects look like?” one candidate asks.

“No comment,” Marshal Leonis says. “Anything else?” 

“Where’s the rendezvous point?”

“No comment.” 

“Uh, sir, are we getting flashlights?” another candidate asks. 

“No,” Marshal Leonis says. A ripple of unease runs through the crowd of assembled candidates. Which is a little weird, because it’s really not too dark to see. OK, so they’ll have to pay a little more attention than usual, but flashlights would just draw the enemy right to them, right? 

There are no more questions. Marshal Leonis nods. 

“Then your time starts now,” he says, and steps aside. 

There’s an immediate rush, everyone trying to head into the woods at once and running into each other, tripping over stuff and generally being a mess. Prompto shoves his way in with the second wave and realises pretty quickly that he’s not going to be able to be quiet enough to evade the enemy with his boots on. He slips away from the crowd, takes them off and slings them round his neck. OK. Magical objects. Avoid the enemy. Got it. 

He outpaces the rest of the candidates pretty quickly – for some reason they all seem to be stumbling a lot, and some of them are even walking into trees and falling into hollows by the path. They’re making a lot of noise, and Prompto hears a couple getting tagged by the Marshal’s people pretty much straight away. It’s weird, because most of these guys were pretty impressive during the day’s exams, but now they – kinda suck? Maybe they just wore themselves out. 

Prompto slips through the trees, keeping alert for any sound or movement that might be the enemy. A couple of times he hides in the undergrowth from a passing black-clad Crownsguard, and once he climbs a tree to avoid a group of three of them. They’re a lot quieter than the candidates, but they’re not making a lot of effort to stay in the shadows, so they’re pretty easy to see. The magical objects, on the other hand, are--

Wait. Prompto stands still, sniffing the breeze. There’s something – weird. The woods are full of funky smells, some of which he’s not very familiar with, and if he wasn’t on the clock he’d definitely be checking a bunch of them out. But this smell is – different. It’s not earth, or damp vegetation, or an interesting animal. It smells – artificial. 

He follows the scent. Three minutes later, he finds a small crystal globe tucked under a tree root. It’s glowing faintly, and the weird smell is definitely coming from here. Magical object? 

Magical object. He tucks it into his pocket and starts moving again, scenting the air as he goes. 

In the end, it turns out that the fact the magical objects smell weird is the key to the whole exercise. Prompto finds two more pretty fast. Now all he has to do is find the rendezvous – and that’s not too hard, because he can smell both Marshal Leonis and coffee not far away. He heads in that direction and finds a clearing with a camp table set up. Marshal Leonis is sitting there in the dark, wearing night-vision goggles and sipping at a cup. There’s no-one else there. 

Prompto stands for a minute or two, waiting for Marshal Leonis to address him. Then he clears his throat. Marshal Leonis starts very slightly and turns to look at him.

“Argentum?” he says. “You OK?” 

“Yes, sir,” Prompto says. He pulls the little crystal globes out of his pocket. “I, uh – these are what I’m supposed to be getting, right?” 

Marshal Leonis looks at what he’s got in his hands, then looks up at him. He glances at his watch, then looks at him again. Shit, is Prompto late? Is there no-one else here because they’ve all finished already?

“Good,” Marshal Leonis says. “Sit. Don’t make any noise.” 

Prompto sits. Marshal Leonis sips his coffee in silence. Nothing happens. Occasionally, there’s the sound of distant human voices from the woods. But there’s nothing else.

Prompto falls asleep.

He wakes up when he hears someone crashing through the trees towards them. It’s one of the other candidates – one who’s been doing pretty well all day. She keeps stumbling as she comes towards them, but she finally makes it into the clearing. 

“Sir,” she says, and holds out a handful of crystal globes. 

“Good,” Marshal Leonis says. “Sit next to Argentum. Don’t make a sound.” 

“Ar-- gentum?” the candidate says. She glances around like she can’t see him. “I’m not the first?”

“I said don’t make a sound, soldier,” Marshal Leonis says. 

The candidate sinks to the ground, nowhere near Prompto. So maybe he isn’t the last, after all. 

~

It takes another two hours for all the rest of the candidates to arrive. Only about a third of them have made it through – the rest got tagged by the enemy and taken back to the starting point. The sky’s starting to get light when they finally pile back into the vans and head for the Citadel. Prompto’s feeling more alert now, but underneath it is a bone-deep exhaustion that’s going to require two or three days of serious napping to shift. He can’t even bring himself to care about the fact that he’s almost certainly failed. At least it’s over. 

Back at the Citadel, Prompto’s filing back into the gym when Marshal Leonis – Cor the actual Immortal – catches him by the arm and pulls him aside. 

“Argentum,” he says. 

Prompto braces himself, either for being told to go home because he’s failed or for being told that actually, the final exercise was a fake out and there’s _another_ final exercise. But Marshal Leonis just looks him up and down and frowns. 

“You’re colourblind,” he says. 

“Huh?” Prompto blinks. “I am?” He’s never noticed being colourblind. He’s pretty sure he sees colours.

Marshal Leonis nods. Prompto feels suddenly cold. 

“Does that mean I failed?” he says. 

“Nope,” Marshal Leonis says. “Just thought you’d like to know, since you didn’t mention it on the questionnaire.” He pulls out a clipboard and frowns at it. “Colourblind, nearsighted, tachycardic. Poor balance, possible ADHD.” 

“Uh,” Prompto says, feeling kind of sick. “I – um – I already knew about the nearsighted thing. I wear – contacts--” He wonders if he should ask what _tachycardic_ means or if knowing that is another part of the test. 

“Prince Noctis wants you as part of his personal retinue,” Marshal Leonis says. 

Prompto chews his lip. “Yeah, we’re – uh, we’re friends.” 

“I’m aware of that.” Marshal Leonis stares at him. Prompto wishes he was – anywhere, anywhere at all except right here. 

“No-one’s ever completed the night scavenger hunt in less than four hours,” the Marshal says. “You took one hour fifty.” 

Prompto wonders if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Marshal Leonis looks – really kinda pissed, but then, he always pretty much looks like that. 

Marshal Leonis stares at him. “We’ll work with you on the balance thing,” he says. “Could be an inner ear problem. I’m referring you to the Citadel psychology unit to follow up on the ADHD, and the medical unit for the tachycardia.” 

“Oh,” Prompto says. “OK.” 

The Marshal nods and makes a couple of marks on the clipboard. “You’ll need a higher security clearance if you’re going to be in the Prince’s retinue,” he says. “And you’ll need training for connecting to his magic.” 

“Um?” Prompto says. “I-- You-- Retinue?” 

Marshal Leonis raises his eyebrows. “OK, kid. I get it. It’s been a long day. Go get your certificate and go home.” 

Prompto suddenly realises something. Something that makes him feel – kind of amazing.

“I – passed?” he says. 

The Marshal stares at him. “You heard the part about the night scavenger hunt, right?” he says. 

Prompto suddenly really, really, _really_ wants to rub his head all over Marshal Cor the Immortal Leonis. It’s only all the practice at being normal over the last few months that stops him from just – doing it. 

“Argentum,” Marshal Leonis says, snapping his fingers in front of his face. “Go home before you fall over.” 

Prompto goes into the gym and gets his certificate. He goes home. He lies down in the bed. He feels like he’s floating. He feels like it’s the best day of his life. He feels like he doesn’t really believe it’s happening. He feels – really fucking tired.

He goes to sleep. 

~

The Crownsguard investment ceremony’s scheduled for two weeks before Prompto’s nineteenth birthday. It’s a pretty crazy time – there’s a lot of uniform stuff he has to get and protocol he has to learn, training for connecting with Noct’s magic and a terrifyingly detailed background check – and the days fly by, so that before he knows it, he’s standing in the Throne Room along with all the other new Crownsguard recruits, feeling the weight of his heavy Crownsguard coat and watching as the King calls up each recruit in turn, investing them with his solemn trust. 

When it comes to be his turn, he concentrates very hard on not tripping over his own feet on his way up the stairs, and also on not purring. _Don’t trip, don’t purr, don’t trip, don’t purr, don’t trip don’t purr--_ And then he’s kneeling in front of the King. The actual King of Lucis. Who smiles and winks at him.

“Well done, Prompto,” he murmurs, then reaches out and lays a hand on his head, starting the incantation that Prompto’s already heard a dozen times. He’s too distracted by the weight of the hand on his head to listen to the words this time – _don’t purr don’t purr don’t purr_ – so he only really notices once the King’s done, because that’s when Prompto tries to get up and Gladio’s dad reaches out and pushes him back down. The King smiles at him again, then turns his attention to the watching crowd. 

“My son, Prince Noctis Lucis Caelum, has chosen Prompto Argentum as a member of his personal retinue,” he announces. Most people know that already – it’s been in all the magazines – so there’s not much of a stir. Then Prompto realises Noct is standing next to him, with Ignis and Gladio behind him in their capacities as Noct’s current retainers, and he remembers that Noct has to do – a thing to link him with his magic and make the whole thing official. Quickly, he shuffles round on his knees and holds up his clasped hands. Noct wraps his own hands around Prompto’s and closes his eyes. 

A hush falls over the hall. Everybody loves watching the royals do magic, and Prompto guesses they’re all craning for a closer look. Meanwhile, Prompto’s head itches. And his face. And his ass, right on the tailbone. This is definitely not a good time for Prompto’s ass to itch. Not that it would be a big deal, except it _really_ itches. Like, it kinda hurts. And his head kinda hurts, too, like someone’s just cut two shallow gashes in his skin on either side of his crown. Is this what being linked to Noct’s magic feels like? Prompto hopes it’s temporary. Ignis and Gladio have never said anything about their heads and asses hurting. Not that Ignis would say the word _ass_ , he’s too refined for that, but Gladio definitely would, and--

“Prompto?” Noct says. Prompto looks up at him to see that he’s staring down, looking – concerned? Worried? Maybe a little scared? And he’s not looking Prompto in the eye. Instead he’s looking at the part of his head that hurts. Prompto does his best to look like nothing hurts at all. 

“What the fuck is that?” Gladio murmurs. 

Prompto wonders what he’s talking about, and then suddenly his head hurts _a lot_. He fights against it, determined not to make an idiot of himself in front of basically every important person in Lucis, not to mention in front of Noctis and Gladio and Ignis and the fucking King, the actual King who’s within arm’s reach of him right now oh shit it really hurts--

He can’t help himself, pulling his hands out of Noct’s grasp and clutching at his head. He’s vaguely aware that Noct has dropped to his knees and is holding Prompto’s shoulders, asking him if he’s OK. He is OK, he’s fine. He’s not weird, he’s not different, he is totally normal and definitely not having some kind of episode right in front of the fucking throne. 

Then, just as suddenly as it appeared, the pain goes away. Or at least, it subsides to a weird sort of aching itch. Prompto tries to scratch, but Noct grabs his hands and pulls them away.

“What’s wrong?” he says. “Let me see—” 

Then he stops talking and stares at Prompto’s head. He looks – astonished. And then he looks – kind of delighted. 

“Oh, my,” Ignis murmurs behind him, somehow sounding much clearer than usual even over the murmuring of the audience, who of course have now all witnessed Prompto losing it oh crap. There’s – something attached to his head, two things, one on each side, and when he reaches up his hand brushes against some kind of stiff wire that seems to be – uh sticking out of his cheek? – and his whole body goes _proximity alert!_

Something’s not right. Aside from Prompto fucking losing it in front of everyone important in the entire fucking kingdom, something is definitely, definitely wrong.

“Well,” says the King, and Prompto looks up to see him wearing a perplexed expression. “That’s never happened before.”


	3. Cat's out of the bag

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys! Thwippersnapple drew [ another cuuuuute picture](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1280609670453846017)! And at record speed -- I swear it was only a few hours between the chapter going up and this appearing in my inbox. All the expressions in this are so amazing -- please go and enjoy and give the artist some love ♥
> 
> Uh, and just to warn you, this particular chapter is possibly a little bit more angsty than the "light angst" tag suggests. What can I say, I can't help myself!

“Noct,” Prompto whispers, trying to reach up again and find out what the fuck is stuck to his head. “Something’s wrong.” 

Noct’s eyes shift from – whatever the fuck is up with his head to his face, and then his expression changes. “Are you OK?” he asks. “Does it hurt?” 

“Does _what_ hurt?” Prompto asks. “Noct – everyone’s looking.” 

Noct just stares at him, but Ignis suddenly moves, murmuring something to Gladio’s dad. Gladio’s dad takes off his cloak and hands it to Ignis, and Ignis reaches around Noct and drops the cloak on Prompto’s head, wrapping it round him so that only his face is uncovered. 

“Your majesty,” Ignis murmurs to the King. 

The King nods and turns to the assembled crowd. “It seems Mr Argentum is not well,” he says. “No photographs, please. If you would give us a moment.” 

“OK,” Noct says, putting his arm round Prompto. “Let’s get out of here.” 

Prompto almost falls on the stairs, only Noct’s arm keeping him upright. There’s – _something_ in his pants, something bulky and warm and – furry? He wants it the fuck out of there, but he can’t exactly go digging around in his pants in front of every important person in Lucis. He hopes to all the Astrals that Gladio’s dad’s cloak covers that part of him and keeps his eyes trained on the steps. He looks up once, sees ranks of faces staring at him – all the Crownsguard, all the nobles, _everyone_ , shit this is the worst day of his life – and then doesn’t look up again.

On the platform halfway down the stairs is a door that Prompto’s never really noticed before. Ignis pushes it open and ushers him and Noct through. He’s leaning pretty heavily on Noct by now, desperately trying to stave off an impending panic attack. He hears a hushed murmur from the crowd just before Gladio closes the door firmly behind them. Then there’s a short flight of steps, a corridor, another door and, finally, a room. It’s pretty big, scattered with expensive-looking black couches and hung with portraits of old-school Lucian nobility. There’s a set of decanters on a table on one side and Ignis strides over and pours something amber-coloured into a glass, then holds it out to him. He takes it, swallows it in one gulp, then immediately regrets it. Shit, that’s strong. 

“Sit down,” Noct says, guiding him to one of the couches. 

“I—” Prompto says. He looks at Noct, then, helplessly, at Ignis. “There’s – something in my – in my pants.” Whatever it is is really uncomfortable. His cheeks are burning hot enough that he could probably start a fire right now. Maybe that would help. Burn down the whole Citadel and distract everyone from whatever the fuck just happened. 

Ignis and Gladio exchange a glance. “Let me see,” says Ignis. 

Prompto stares at him. Ignis’s face softens. 

“Prompto, let me help you,” he says. 

Prompto doesn’t know what else to do. There’s not even any point pretending any more. Everyone saw. He might as well – just let Ignis do whatever it is he wants to do. 

He takes off the cloak. Ignis steps behind him. “Ah,” he says. “Prompto, I think you may need to take them off.” 

“What?” Prompto whispers. Somehow, his face kicks it up a notch. He’s surprised Noct isn’t getting a contact burn from the heat. 

“Nothing we haven’t seen before,” Gladio says. Then he looks Prompto up and down. “Actually, I’m gonna take that back.” 

“Thanks for your help, Gladio,” Ignis says, the edge in his tone sharp enough that even Prompto flinches. “If you wouldn’t mind giving Prompto a little privacy.” 

Gladio shrugs and turns his back. Ignis looks at Noct.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Noct says. He’s still supporting Prompto, and even with everything, Prompto’s glad of it. If Noct wasn’t there, he might just fall over. “But I’m closing my eyes, OK, Prompto?” 

“Yeah,” Prompto whispers. He feels like he’s been swept up in something he doesn’t understand at all. Thankfully, Ignis seems to have a handle on things. He’ll just do what Ignis tells him. That’s gotta be the best way. 

“If you wouldn’t mind, Prompto,” Ignis says. His voice is weirdly gentle. “I do apologise for the invasion of your privacy.” 

Prompto nods. He unbuckles his belt and unfastens his pants. He closes his eyes and pushes them down. It’s a little tricky to get them over whatever the – _obstruction_ is in back, but as soon as he succeeds the feeling of discomfort recedes. A moment later, he feels Ignis touching him. Ignis is touching him, but it’s – weird, because he can’t identify _where_ Ignis is touching him. He can feel the touch, but it’s like – it’s on a part of his body that’s somehow hidden, that no-one’s ever touched before. He’s heard about that thing where people can still sometimes feel a limb after it’s been cut off. This is like the opposite of that. 

“Yes, as I suspected,” Ignis says. “Prompto, I’m just going to make a hole in your boxers. Don’t panic, please.” 

“Make a _what_?” Prompto says, but before he has time to get a good head of steam on the panic that Ignis seems to think he can somehow suppress at will, there’s a quiet tearing sound, Ignis pulls gently on whatever part of his body he’s touching, and the feeling of discomfort disappears entirely. 

“Holy shit,” Noct whispers, and Prompto turns to see him staring at a weird furry snake thing that’s appeared over Prompto’s shoulder. A weird furry snake thing. 

A tail. 

“Dude,” Noct says. His face is shifting rapidly between excitement and worry. “You’ve got a tail.” 

“I’ve got a what?” Prompto says. His mind seems to have gone completely blank.

“Perhaps you should sit down,” says Ignis.

~

Gladio gets Prompto another glass of eye-wateringly strong booze. Ignis gets him a mirror. 

“What?” Prompto whispers, staring at his reflection. The objects that are stuck to his head are two – ears. Orange tabby ears that, apart from their size, look like they belong on a cat. They look like they belong on a cat, but they’re not on a cat. They’re on Prompto. Not just on Prompto, as he discovers when he raises a shaking hand to tug on one, but attached to Prompto. Part of his body. When he touches them, he can feel it – just like before, like a touch on his body but with no location information attached. Phantom Ear Syndrome. 

“What?” Prompto says again. 

As well as the ears, he’s got – whiskers. He tries to think of another word for them, but there they are, obviously nothing other than whiskers, sticking out of his face, and he can feel _them_ , too, constantly, every time there’s a slight movement of air.

And then there’s the tail. 

“It’s so soft,” Noct whispers, running his hand over the tail. Prompto can feel it, that disembodied sense that someone is touching him. He can see Noct touching the tail and he can feel it, because the tail belongs to him. 

There’s a strong possibility that he’s going to be sick. 

“Noct,” he says, trying and failing to keep his voice steady. “You can fix this. You can – undo whatever you did. Right? You can fix this, right?” 

Noct tears his eyes away from the tail – _Prompto’s_ tail – and frowns at him. “I didn’t do anything,” he says. “I mean – I linked you with the crystal, but all this – I didn’t do this.” 

“Bullshit,” Prompto says. His voice sounds really high-pitched, which is a drop in the ocean compared to the awful, mortifying things that have happened to him since Noct turned him into a fucking cat, but somehow makes him feel even worse anyway. “It was your magic. Nothing happened until you started doing magic, so – just make it go away. Please.” 

Noct looks bewildered. He looks up at Ignis. “Specs?” 

Ignis sighs and sits down. “Neither of you is wrong, exactly,” he says. “I agree that it was the crystal that did this, but Noct didn’t have anything to do with it. The crystal has healing powers – it’s not the first time that being linked to it has healed an old injury.” 

“Healed?” Prompto says. “Old injury? Iggy, it gave me fucking _cat ears_.” 

Ignis pushes his glasses up his nose. “Ah – I suspect that in fact, what it did was restore parts of your body that were – removed at some point in the past.” 

“Removed?” Prompto says. 

“He’s saying you’ve always been part cat,” Gladio says. “Which explains the box thing.” 

“That’s not—” Prompto says, looking from Gladio to Ignis to Noct and back to Ignis. “That’s not even possible.” 

“I wonder if you had a scar?” Ignis says. “More or less where your tail is currently attached?”

Prompto stares at him. “That--” he says. “I – fell off my bike--” 

“Do you remember falling off your bike?” Ignis asks. 

“No, but I-- But my parents told me--” 

Under his wristband, his right wrist feels suddenly hot and prickly. His parents – his mom – always told him that he fell off his bike. And she told him that the soft spots on either side of his head were from a weird disease where the bones in a baby’s skull don’t fuse properly, but that it was nothing to worry about. And that the barcode tattooed on his wrist was because of a sadistic orphanage and he shouldn’t ever show it to anyone. He’s never shown it to anyone. 

His mom told him he shouldn’t worry about being weird. But he did worry. He tried so hard to fix himself. And now--

“Um,” Prompto says, holding out his empty glass, “is there any more booze?” 

~

Prompto’s halfway through his third glass of royal moonshine when the door opens and Cor the freaking Immortal walks in. Prompto makes an embarrassingly high-pitched noise and casts around for Gladio’s dad’s cloak, only to discover Ignis has folded it and set it on a chair well out of arm’s reach. He also, in his flailing, manages to smack himself in the face with his tail, which would be the weirdest experience he’s had all day if it wasn’t for all the other experiences he’s had today. Finally, he settles for shoving the tail into the gap in the couch cushions and covering his head with his arms. He can’t do anything about the whiskers, but – maybe the Marshal won’t notice them?

Of course, there’s also the thing where Marshal Leonis was in the Throne Room when Prompto suddenly grew multiple cat body parts, so he’s probably already noticed. Damn. 

Marshal Leonis sits down opposite Prompto and stares at him. Prompto hunches himself down as small as he can go. He becomes suddenly very aware that he’s wearing his Crownsguard coat and a pair of boxers. As if having a fucking tail wasn’t humiliation enough. 

“You OK?” Marshal Leonis says. 

Prompto tries to say something, but it just comes out as a kind of squeak. 

Marshal Leonis looks at Ignis. “He OK?” 

“He’s quite distressed,” Ignis says, because he couldn’t just let Prompto have a tiny bit of dignity in front of Cor the freaking Immortal. _Distressed_ makes him sound like he’s a fucking kitten. “It’s been a shock.” 

Prompto becomes aware that Noct, sitting beside him, has shoved his hand down between the couch cushions and is petting Prompto’s tail. It’s pretty distracting. 

Marshal Leonis nods. “Let me see,” he says to Prompto.

Prompto really, really doesn’t want the Marshal to see. But he leans forward and peels Prompto’s arms away from his head, and Prompto doesn’t resist, because let’s face it, when it comes to The Immortal resistance is pretty much futile. 

Marshal Leonis examines his ears for a few moments. Then he peers at the whiskers. Then he eyes the couch cushions. 

“Tail too, huh?” he says. 

Prompto swallows. “Uh – yeah,” he says. His voice comes out sounding like he’s just smoked two packs of cigarettes. Marshal Leonis glances at his face and frowns. 

“You gonna be sick?” he says. 

“Um—” Prompto thinks about it. He didn’t eat much this morning from nerves and now the two and a half glasses of firewater are sitting heavily in his stomach. But the last thing he needs is to throw up in front of the Marshal. So he won’t throw up. Great, that’s settled. “No.” 

Marshal Leonis nods. “Got something you need to see,” he says, and stands. “Follow me.” 

Prompto manages to get to his feet, but walking turns out to be kind of tricky. The tail is just – moving about on its own, and not only does he smack Noct in the face (which Noct looks weirdly pleased about), but he almost trips several times just because the fucking thing keeps making him overbalance. As if he wasn’t clumsy enough already, fuck. Somehow, though, he makes it to the door, manages not to shut his tail in it, and follows the Marshal down the corridor, up some stairs (where he does trip and would have landed flat on his face if Marshal Leonis hadn’t caught him), down another corridor, until finally they find themselves outside the Marshal’s office. They don’t encounter anyone on the way, and Prompto is endlessly thankful for that (not least because uhhh shit he’s still pantsless), but by the time they get to the office Prompto feels sick from the tension. 

“Sit down,” Marshal Leonis says once they’re inside the office. He opens his laptop, then turns it to face Prompto. “Here. I dug this out and had it digitised after the Crownsguard exam.” 

Prompto stares at the screen. He has no idea what the Crownsguard exam has to do with anything, or why the Marshal would want to show him something that’s old enough he needed to get it digitised. 

The video starts to play. The image is of what looks like a hospital or lab of some sort. Whoever’s standing beside the camera speaks. “Day two. Subject ID 05953234.”

Prompto swallows. 05953234 is the number that’s tattooed on his wrist. He feels suddenly – very cold. 

The camera swings around and focuses on a glass box. Inside the box is – a baby. A baby with cat ears and a barcode tattooed on its tiny wrist. 

“Two sets of ears,” the voice behind the camera says. It’s a man, not a voice Prompto recognises. A hand appears, pointing at the cat ears, then at the human ears that the baby also has. “A mistake, or intentional?” Prompto thinks the baby is asleep, but then the man holding the camera snaps his fingers on one side of the baby’s head and the baby turns towards the sound, and Prompto realises the baby’s eyes are just – closed. “At least one set is functional,” the voice says. “No telling which – or whether both are functional – until subject is mature enough for more in-depth testing.”

Prompto reaches up and touches his new ears. Everything’s been sounding – much clearer than usual since Noct turned him into a cat. So that kinda suggests that the new ears hear stuff, maybe even better than his real ears. 

Onscreen, the hand picks up the baby – fuck, it’s small – and turns it on its front. The baby moves its limbs weakly and makes a tiny mewing noise. The hand points at the tail, emerging from a hole cut in a diaper. “Tail appears fully mobile,” the man says. “Unknown as yet whether the Niflheim experiments have resulted in lowered IQ or other intellectual impairment.”

 _Intellectual impairment_. Prompto remembers his mother telling him that sometimes people get called _different_ when they’re _a little dumb_. He feels like maybe he might cry. No. No, he can’t cry, not in front of the Marshal. He won’t be sick and he won’t cry. He won’t cry. 

The video cuts out, and then there’s a new segment. The light’s changed, but the view is of the same room. “Day Four. Subject ID 05953234. Subject’s eyes are still closed, and--”

“Hey,” comes another voice, and this one Prompto does recognise. The camera swings round to show Cor Leonis, Cor the actual Immortal, looking like he’s about twelve but striding into the room like he’s forty-five and the most important person in the kingdom. 

“Leonis,” the voice says. It sounds oddly disdainful. Prompto winces, imagining someone speaking to the Marshal in that tone now. The Marshal onscreen – not the Marshal yet, Prompto supposes, but he can’t quite bring himself to think of him as just _Cor_ – has no reaction to camera-guy’s tone. 

“Came to see how the kid’s doing,” Marshal Leonis says. He leans over the glass box. “Damn. He’s cute, huh? Eyes still shut?”

“I’m very busy--” the voice behind the camera says, and then cuts off when Cor the twelve-year-old Immortal reaches in and picks up the baby. The baby immediately grips the Marshal’s shirt in both fists, mewing pitifully. The Marshal holds the baby close in to his chest and pets its ears. 

“Can’t you get him a better crib? This one’s pretty – cold-looking.”

“I have a lot of work to do, so if you wouldn’t mind--”

Camera-guy reaches out and removes the baby from Marshal Leonis’ grasp, laying it back in the crib. The baby, eyes closed, waves its arms and legs around and wails a tiny, mewling wail. Fuck. It really is cute, ears and all. 

Marshal Leonis glares at the camera. Prompto resists the urge to cower. “Listen, asshole--” Marshal Leonis says, and then the feed cuts out and is replaced by a new image. The same room, but this time, the King is there. He looks young and – kinda hot, his hair black with just a touch of grey. Shit, is it treason to think the King is hot? Wait, shit, is it being a bad friend to think Noct’s dad is hot? Fuck.

“If you’ll excuse me, I just thought it would be interesting to see--” says the King, leaning over the crib. “Ah. Yes, I see.”

“Cute, right?” says a voice off camera. Marshal Leonis. 

“Hm,” the King says, hesitating over the crib. His face is impassive. 

“Here.” Marshal Leonis appears from one side, picks up the baby and hands it to the King. The King hesitates briefly, then takes it. The baby clings to him, licking his chest. Ohhhhh fuck, Prompto licked the King’s chest when he was a baby. That is definitely treason. 

“Your Majesty,” camera-guy’s voice says. “There is an opportunity here to learn a great deal about what the enemy is planning and the level of their technology.” 

The King nods. He doesn’t look like he’s really listening, though. He’s peering down at the baby, tickling its ears with his forefinger. “Noct loves cats,” he says, apparently to no-one in particular. “It’s such a shame--”

Another jump-cut. The same scene, different light. The glass box is gone, replaced with a more conventional-looking crib, with some bright toys hanging over it. Gladio’s dad is there, talking to the camera. Or the guy behind the camera, most likely. Marshal Leonis is standing by the crib, holding the baby. The baby’s eyes are open and it’s chewing on its own tail.

“--human rights issues,” Gladio’s dad says. “It’s a difficult conundrum, but ultimately the King has decided this is the best way forward. Are you prepared to perform the operation?”

“I don’t think you’ve considered all the angles here--” says camera guy. 

“Believe me, we’ve considered at great length,” Gladio’s dad says. “There’s no way to use half-measures here without risking a serious security breach, not to mention ruining the poor child’s life. We need to bury this and not dig it up again.”

Camera-guy sighs. “I understand,” he says. 

“So you’re prepared to perform the surgery?” Gladio’s dad says. “I’d prefer not to bring anyone else into this.”

“Of course,” camera-guy says. 

Marshal Leonis sighs and puts the baby back in the crib. “It’s gonna suck for the little guy,” he says. 

“Cor, we’ve talked about this,” Gladio’s dad says. “It would be much worse for him growing up with – Growing up the way he is.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Marshal Leonis says. He leans over the crib. “Good luck, kid,” he says. “Hope you don’t need it.”

A jump cut. The view is of a table with the sleeping kitten-baby on it. “Day Eight. Subject ID 05953234,” says the now-familiar voice. “Preparing to remove external feline appendages.” A hand appears in the view holding a scalpel, and then Marshal Leonis reaches over and presses a button on the laptop.

“You don’t need to see that,” he says. 

Prompto nods frantically. He’s not going to throw up. Definitely not going to throw up _or_ cry. Fuck.

The final scene of the recording is a different room, this one comfortably appointed with couches and a low table. There’s a smiling woman Prompto doesn’t recognise and two people that he does: his parents. 

“Well, I’m glad to say you’ve passed all the requirements,” the woman says. “I must warn you again that there’s a strong chance the child may turn out to have – special needs. He’s been poorly treated.”

His dad looks very serious. His mom clasps her hands together and nods. “We’re ready to give him anything he needs,” she says. “He’ll get nothing but love in our home.” Prompto feels a lump in his throat. Mom – he wishes she was here. 

The woman smiles, then goes out of the room. When she comes back, she’s carrying the baby, barely recognisable now that his ears and tail are gone. 

“Meet your new son,” she says, putting the baby into Prompto’s mom’s arms. Prompto’s mom immediately bursts into tears, stroking her finger along the baby’s cheek. 

“Oh,” she says. “He’s perfect. He’s perfect just the way he is.” 

OK, maybe Prompto is going to cry, after all. Bringing out a dude’s mom is just unfair. 

“What’s this?” Prompto’s dad asks, reaching for the barcode tattoo.

“Classified,” the woman says. “Make sure he keeps it covered at all times.”

Prompto’s dad nods, looking serious. Prompto’s actually not sure he’s ever seen his dad look any other way. Prompto’s mom is too caught up in cooing over the baby to respond. Then the screen goes blank.

“That’s it,” Marshal Leonis says. “The tapes were pretty degraded in places, so the techs only managed to recover some parts of it.” 

Prompto nods, swiping at his face and accidentally setting all his whisker-proximity alerts off at once. It takes him a second to recover from that. “So you knew this whole time?” 

“I didn’t keep track of you,” Marshal Leonis says. “Never found out what your parents named you. It wasn’t until we did the enhanced background check for the Crownsguard exam that I checked into your sealed adoption record and figured out who you were. And it seemed like everything had gone to plan and you’d grown up normal, until today.” 

_Normal_. Prompto laughs without really meaning to. He sounds half-hysterical. Marshal Leonis watches him across the desk. 

“I’m – a Niff,” Prompto says finally. “An Niff _experiment_. But you let me take the Crownsguard exam anyway?” 

“You passed the background check,” Marshal Leonis says. “I’m not gonna reject a promising candidate because of something that happened before he could even crawl. It didn’t occur to me that the magic would do this, though. That one’s on me.” 

“And now?” 

“Now?” Marshal Leonis says. 

“I mean – I guess you need to – disinvest me, or whatever,” Prompto says, gesturing at his – everything. 

Marshal Leonis watches him for a long moment. Then he leans back in his chair. 

“How’d you do the night scavenger hunt so fast?” he asks. 

“Uh,” Prompto says, feeling a little bewildered by the change in subject. “I mean – it wasn’t – that hard? Once I figured out that the little ball thingies smell weird, it was pretty simple.” 

Marshal Leonis nods. “They smell weird, huh?” he says. 

“Yeah,” Prompto says, and then frowns. “I mean – don’t they?” 

“What about finding your way in the dark?” the Marshal says. 

“Well, uh, it – it wasn’t really that dark? I mean, yeah, it was night and all, but not too dark to see stuff.” 

“Gotcha,” Marshal Leonis says. “So you’re saying you can see in the dark and you have a superhuman sense of smell?” 

“Uh—” Prompto says. 

“I’m not disinvesting you, Argentum. But I am giving you a week off. Go home. Get some rest. When you come back, we’ll see what else you can do.” 

Prompto feels like everything is moving super fast. It’s disorienting. He’s not even sure what the Marshal’s talking about. There’s – so much information and he just – really wants to hide in his box. Or in a different box, one that’s not in Noct’s apartment, so he doesn’t have to see Noct or Ignis or Gladio or anyone at all. 

“Yes, sir,” he says, and stands up. He makes it out of the door without doing anything stupid with his tail, but his half-formed plan to get the hell out of the Citadel immediately is fucked up by the fact that Noct is leaning against the wall outside the office, Gladio and Ignis hovering behind him.

“Prompto!” Noct says. “You OK?” 

“No,” Prompto mutters. Noct puts a hand on his back and rubs the way he does sometimes, the way that always feels so good, like he’s--

\--like he’s petting a cat. 

Prompto steps forward, away from Noct’s hand. “I should – go home,” he says. “Um. Fuck.” He imagines himself on the subway, tail getting in everyone’s way, everyone staring, fuck, everyone’s going to stare at him everywhere he goes for the rest of his fucking life-- “How am I going to get home?” 

“I’ll drive you,” Ignis says, because thank fuck for Ignis as always. “I’ll find you something to wear.” 

So that’s how Prompto ends up slouched in the back of one of Noct’s shiny black cars, tail tucked into a pair of Noct’s sweatpants, head wrapped in a bandana that’s pressing his ears painfully down. The whiskers, they can’t do anything about without putting him in full-on Hazmat gear, which would probably draw even more attention than the whiskers themselves, so Prompto just slouches and reminds himself that the windows are tinted and no-one can see in. 

Ignis pulls up outside Prompto’s house. Prompto has no idea what time it is – the investment ceremony must be long over by now, all the new Crownsguard must be at the reception, laughing about the freak who got turned into a cat. He goes to open the door, and Noct, who insisted on coming with them, reaches out and grabs his wrist. 

“Hey,” he says. “I still think you should come stay with me for a while.” 

Prompto stares at the Noct’s hand on his wrist. Underneath it, the tattoo itches. He wonders how much Noct knows about his – everything. How much Gladio and Ignis know. Did Marshal Leonis tell them about the background check? Have they seen the videos? 

“I’m good,” he says, pulling his wrist out of Noct’s grip. “I gotta – talk to my parents.” 

He gets out of the car, heads up the steps as fast as he can without falling over, and slips through the door, closing it hard behind him. He sinks to the ground, digging his stupid tail out of his pants and banging his head back against the closed door. Outside, he hears the engine of Noct’s car idling. He imagines Noct and Iggy, arguing about whether to come and look worried at him some more or just leave him be.

_Just leave me be. Please, just leave me be._

Eventually, the engine sound increases in pitch and volume, and he hears the car drive away. He hears it for a lot longer than he usually would. Which makes sense, because he has two fucking sets of fucking ears. 

“Shit,” Prompto whispers. He pulls out his phone. He should call his parents. Fuck, what is he going to say to his parents? 

There’s a news alert on his phone. _Magical Meowhem: Prince Noctis turns best friend into cat at Crownsguard investment ceremony!_

“Meowhem?” Prompto mutters. Wow, he suddenly really regrets subscribing to this shitty tabloid. He shoves his phone back in his pocket and closes his eyes. He should call his parents. He should – probably eat something. He should – definitely not cry. 

He puts his hand over his face, brushing against his whiskers. _Proximity alert!_ screams his brain. 

Yep. Definitely not crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I totally stole "Magical Meowhem" from Lucorinth, who came up with a bunch of genius tabloid headlines after last chapter ♥


	4. Cat got your tongue?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fellow catboy-fanciers, I am here to inform you that Thwippersnapple has made yet another piece of art, and this time it is an [ADORABLE picture](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1281712252135944193) of KITTENBABY PROMPTO getting CUDDLES. If that's not enough to brighten your weekend, I don't know what is :D
> 
> Also, this will in fact be more than four chapters and I am henceforth banning myself from estimating chapter counts.

Prompto spends most of the next thirty-six hours in bed. 

His phone buzzes a lot to begin with, and after a couple of hours he steels himself and unlocks the screen to see what’s going on. He’d thought maybe it would be messages from Noct, or maybe his parents, but what he sees instead is a seemingly endless string of notifications from his ChocoChat account. He reads a few of them and understands that somehow, people have figured out that the account belongs to the guy who turned into a cat in front of half of Lucis. There’s interview requests in there from a bunch of different media outlets, but most of it is a stream of bullshit, emojis, memes, the same jokes repeated fifteen hundred times, death threats for some reason, and propositions for sex (wtf???), all of it in reply to his most recent Chat, which is a photo he took of some ducklings in Highriver Park. 

Prompto locks his phone again and stuffs it under his pillow. Then he stuffs his head under the pillow, too. A few minutes later, he unlocks his phone again and deletes his ChocoChat account. Then he turns the phone off and goes to throw it across the room before remembering that if it breaks he’ll have to buy a new one. He drops it under the bed, instead. Then he puts the pillow over his head and closes his eyes. 

A couple of hours later, there’s a knock at the front door. He ignores it, burrowing even deeper under his covers. There’s another knock. Then the sound of someone calling through the door, loud enough that he can hear it all the way in his bedroom. Shit, he can hear so much more stuff now. He fucking hates it. 

“Mr Argentum? This is Petra Caelestis from One Lucis News. I wanted to talk to you about the Crownsguard Investment Ceremony.” 

Prompto’s eyes snap open, and he stares into the darkness under his pillow. He should have anticipated it – of course they know who he is, the King announced his name right before the whole cat-thing happened – but somehow it just didn’t occur to him that the press would come to his house. He swallows, hardly daring to breathe. There’s another knock and the reporter calls his name again. He doesn’t move. She doesn’t knock again.

Prompto waits about fifteen minutes, then slides cautiously out of the bed and crawls across the floor, below the level where anyone on the ground would be able to see him through the window. When he reaches the wall underneath the window, he steels himself, and then crouches, lifting his head just enough to see through the lowermost part of the pane. 

There’s a news van on the street outside his house with three or four people standing around it carrying TV broadcast equipment. A woman he vaguely recognises as a reporter he’s seen on TV before is talking to the cameraman. And the thing is – it’s not the only van out there. There are at least two others that Prompto can see, each with its own complement of people and equipment. 

Shit. 

Prompto ducks back down, then reaches up and pulls the curtains shut. He sits under the window for a minute or two, trying to come to terms with the fact that not only does he now have cat body parts, but there are people outside his house who want to take pictures of them. And people on the internet who want to have sex with him. They didn’t want to have sex with him before, but now that he has cat parts, they want to. 

After a moment or two of horrified contemplation, his brain decides that all of this is unacceptable and suggests he should just go back to bed. 

He goes back to bed. 

After that, there’s a long period in which time seems to lose meaning. The curtains are closed, so he can’t really tell what time of day it is (not to mention he has his head under the pillow most of the time). Sometimes someone will knock at the front door, but he just ignores it. He’s kind of hungry, but the thought of getting up and going downstairs to get something to eat is half terrifying and half exhausting, so he just ignores the complaints from his stomach. He falls asleep. He wakes up. How much time has passed? He doesn’t know.

The third time he wakes up, though, something’s changed. It takes him a moment or two to figure out what it is, but then he realises that it’s not as dark under the pillow as it was before. He lifts one corner of it and sees that the curtains are open and what looks like early-morning light is streaming through the window. 

Also, Noct is slouched in a chair by his bed, staring at his phone. 

Prompto stares. “Uh – Noct?” he says. 

Noct looks up. “Good, you’re awake,” he says, then frowns. “You look like crap.” 

“Um – thanks?” Prompto says. He takes the pillow off his head and sits up, hugging it to his chest. “How did you get into my house?” 

“Huh? Oh. Ignis,” Noct says, like that explains everything. And really, it kinda does. Prompto doesn’t know whether it means Ignis somehow has a key to his house or Ignis somehow is an expert at picking locks, but either is pretty believable. Maybe both. “You turned your phone off and deleted your ChocoChat account, so we didn’t have any other way to contact you.” 

“Yeah, I – yeah,” Prompto says. 

“Listen—” Noct starts, but then the door slams open and Gladio strides in. 

“Wow,” he says, staring at Prompto. “You look like shit.” 

“Yeah, thanks, big guy,” Prompto says, trying to straighten his hair around his ears. “Love you, too.” 

“Yeah, well, get in the shower. We got a lot to do today.” 

“Uh--? Like what?” Prompto’s main plans for the day are to hide under his covers and pretend the world doesn’t exist. He’s considered some alternatives, like hiding under the bed itself, but he’s not totally sure whether that’s something a normal human being would do, so he’s going with just the covers, to be safe. 

“Training,” Gladio says. “Figure out how to deal with that tail of yours.” He eyes the tail, which is snaking out from under the covers, apparently of its own accord. “Don’t want you falling flat on your face every time you have to climb some stairs.” 

Prompto chews his lip. “I don’t want to learn how to deal with it,” he says. He doesn’t want Gladio in his house, being energetic at him. He doesn’t want Noct here doing a bad job of pretending not to be concerned. He just wants to be left alone so he can feel sorry for himself in peace.

“Tough shit,” Gladio replies. “Don’t see anyone volunteering to catch you every time you trip up for the rest of your life.” 

“Don’t be an ass, Gladio,” Noct says, like Gladio knows how to be any other way. But Prompto’s just realised something. Maybe he doesn’t want the guys here, seeing him like – like this, but on the other hand, maybe they can help him with the only even vague glimmer of a way out of this he’s been able to catch hold of, in amongst the fog of self-pity.

“Hey – I’ve been thinking,” Prompto says. “This – cat stuff. They cut it off once before, so why not – just do it again?” It was a guy from the Citadel that did it. Maybe the same guy can do it again. Maybe he still works there, or at least they can find him and ask him.

Noct and Gladio stare at him. “Uh – how about no?” Noct says finally. “That’s, like, self-mutilation or something.” 

“What?” Prompto says. “I’m not even supposed to have these. That’s – it’s like – it’s a birth defect. Like having a birthmark, or, like, an extra nipple or something. It’s something that ought to get – corrected.” That’s why they did it before, when he was a baby. Because they knew it wasn’t right, that he wouldn’t be able to live a normal life, wouldn’t be able to hide the – parts of him that are all wrong. If it hadn’t been for Noct linking him to the crystal, he would have gone his whole life without even knowing.

Noct and Gladio are still staring. Gladio’s frowning. Noct looks – kinda horrified, which Prompto thinks is messed up. If anything, Noct should be horrified about the fact that he has _cat parts_ , not about him getting plastic surgery so he can be less of a freak. 

“So, anyway, I was thinking – maybe the same guy who did it before?” he says. “Or – I mean, if I need to go private, I guess I can find some money--” 

“Stop,” Noct says. “No. You can’t do that, I – it’d be – against the law or something.” 

At that moment, Ignis appears in the doorway. “What’s against the law?” he asks. 

Noct turns to him. “Prompto wants to – amputate his cat parts,” he says. 

“It’s corrective surgery,” Prompto says. He could probably just cut the whiskers off himself, although with how sensitive they are even the thought of it makes his eyes water. “It happens all the time.” 

“Specs,” Noct says in a pleading tone. Ignis looks at him, then at Prompto. He stands quietly for a moment or two. Then he nods. 

“Prompto,” he says, “I think that now is not the time to be making hasty decisions. Why don’t you spend some time getting to know your new body. You might find it to your liking once you’re accustomed to it.”

Prompto stares at him. Then he looks at Noct and Gladio. They don’t get it, he realises. Iggy thinks he might get to _like_ it. How can they – how can they even think that? Can’t they see how wrong all of this is?

“Iggy, come on,” he says. “This is so – I’m not – I’m not even human.” It’s been eating at him, deeper than everything else, since he arrived home however long ago it was. He’s not human. He’s an experiment, a – freak of nature. It explains so much, and now he can’t even hide it any more. 

“Um, what the fuck? Of course you’re human,” Noct says. 

“Are you serious?” Prompto says. “Fuck, Noct, look at me.” He gestures at his ears, then strips off his wristband and holds up his wrist for Noct to see. “Look at this,” he says. 

Noct looks at it. “What’s – what is that?” he asks. His eyes are wide. 

“The Niffs put it on me when they made me in their lab,” Prompto says. Noct’s eyes widen further. “You – you saw it in the video, right?” 

“Video?” Noct says. He’s still staring at Prompto’s wrist. “...lab?” 

Prompto has a sudden, stomach-lurching realisation. 

“Marshal Leonis showed you the video, right?” he says, voice cracking a little. He looks from Noct to Gladio to Ignis. Noct looks stunned. Gladio looks furious. Ignis looks blank.

“The Marshal informed us that your medical records are confidential,” Ignis says, and oh yeah, fuck, Prompto messed up. He covers up his barcode with his other hand, shoving both hands into his lap. Oh crap, oh _crap_ , how is he so fucking stupid? They didn’t even _know_ , fuck knows what they thought, but they didn’t know, and now he’s told them, even fucking showed them his barcode, the one thing he’s never, ever, ever supposed to do. 

“Prompto?” Noct says. His voice sounds weirdly small. “What lab?” 

“I—” Prompto whispers. Then he realises he’s going to puke. “Fuck,” he says, and jumps to his feet, bolting past Ignis and out onto the landing. He trips over the bathroom doorway – how the fuck does someone trip over a fucking _doorway_? – lands heavily on his knees, and has the presence of mind to slam and lock the door before anyone can come after him. 

Then he pukes. Not a lot, because he hasn’t eaten a lot for a while. But enough to be thoroughly disgusting. He feels – gross. He feels really gross. 

There’s a quiet knock on the door. “Prompto?” comes Noct’s voice. “You OK?” 

Prompto looks down at his barcode. He left the wristband in the bedroom, so he can’t even cover it up again. Fuck, fuck fuck _fuck_.

“Prompto?” Noct says again. 

But Prompto doesn’t answer.

~

After Prompto’s been in the bathroom for some indeterminate amount of time, he realises that Noct hasn’t taken the hint, but is sitting on the other side of the door. He realises this because he hears footsteps approaching and then a quiet conversation between Ignis and Noct that he can’t quite make out, and then footsteps going away again. 

“Noct?” Prompto says.

“Yeah?” comes Noct’s voice. 

“Still out there, huh?” 

“Yeah.” 

Prompto sighs. He’s sitting on the floor by the toilet, thinking and trying not to think and wishing Noct would just leave him alone and being glad that Noct’s there, all at the same time. It’s exhausting. It’s quiet for a couple of minutes, and then Noct speaks again, a little muffled through the door.

“You know I don’t care where you came from, right? None of us care about that.” 

Prompto glares down at his barcode. “How can you not care?” he says. “I’m – a genetic freak.” 

“OK, and?” Noct says. “You’re still the same person you were two days ago.” 

“Yeah, but--” Prompto says. He takes a deep breath. “I mean – I’ve always – the person you thought I was two days ago – that isn’t really me.” 

There’s a pause. “Huh?” Noct says. 

“I – I’ve been – pretending to be normal this whole time, but I’ve never really been – normal, not on the inside.” Prompto squeezes his eyes shut, but a couple of tears slip out anyway. There’s no point pretending any more, not now everyone knows. 

This time there’s a longer pause. “Um,” Noct says at last. “I – never really thought you were normal?” 

Prompto blinks. “Huh?”

“I mean – you’re not – you’ve never been – normal. So it’s not a big deal.” 

Prompto feels a genuine, physical pain in his chest. OK, so he knew Noct and Iggy and Gladio thought he was weird – he heard them talking about it, and the memory of that makes the pain in his chest worse – but the idea that Noct’s _always_ thought he was weird, that he never managed to fool him at all is – it’s--

“Why did you even let me hang out with you?” he asks, even though he’s not sure he wants to hear the answer.

“I didn’t _let_ you-- Fuck.” There’s a thump on the door. “Hey, can I come in? I want to talk to you properly.” 

Prompto doesn’t want to let Noct in. He doesn’t want Noct looking at him, at what he is now. What he’s always been, inside. But he rises to his knees and reaches up, unlocking the door and opening it. Noct’s sitting on the floor on the other side, leaning back against the door, and he almost falls into the room, scrambling to catch himself. 

“Shit, sorry,” Prompto says. 

“No, it’s--” Noct rights himself and scoots into the bathroom on his butt, closing the door behind him. There’s not a lot of floor space that’s not already being taken up by Prompto, but he wedges himself between the shower and the wall and contemplates him. 

“Hey,” he says at last. “I didn’t let you hang out with me. We’re friends. Right? I thought we were friends.”

“I mean, yeah, obviously.” Noct is Prompto’s best friend. He’s the most important thing in Prompto’s life. Oh, there’s that chest pain again. 

“So?” Noct says. “You’re my friend. You, not – some weird idea of you that you’ve just made up, or whatever. So just – stop being so down on yourself, will you? I hate when you do that.” 

Prompto shakes his head. He’s got this weird sensation that he can’t quite place, like somehow he keeps noticing that there’s another person in the room now, but he’s not sure _how_ he’s noticing it. “Are you still even allowed to hang out with me?” 

Noct looks confused. “Why wouldn’t I be?” 

“Because – you know, you’re the prince – and I’m a – Niff experiment – and your dad--” 

“You think he didn’t know I was coming?” Noct says. “He’s worried about you.” 

“Huh?” Prompto stares at him. The _King_ is worried about _him_? 

“Prompto, come on,” Noct says. He shifts, leaning forward a little. “You really think that about me, that I’m shallow enough that I’d drop you because you’re not – whatever it is you think you should be? I – kinda thought you knew me better than that, man.” 

“What? No, no, it’s not – it’s not about what I think about you.” 

“Isn’t it, though?” Noct really sounds – kind of offended. “I mean, you said you’ve been pretending to be normal. Why’re you doing that, if it’s not that you think I’m a dick who only wants to hang out with – other dicks?” 

Prompto gapes at him. “I--” he says. “I never – I don’t think you’re a dick.” 

“Well, then, what’s the issue?” Noct frowns. “I mean – you still want to hang out with me, right?” 

“Uh, duh,” Prompto says.

“And I still want to hang out with you. So – let’s just do that. Why’s there got to be a problem?” 

And Prompto – can’t think of a reason. Noct knows what he is, but – he doesn’t seem to care. Like, at all. Prompto’s not really sure how to deal with that, but he feels a sudden rush of gratitude. He doesn’t know why the hell someone as cool as Noct would want to hang out with him, but he’s never understood that, so maybe things haven’t changed that much.

“Hey,” Noct says. “I know – you’re having a hard time with this. And if you really want to – cut off your cat bits, then I can talk to my dad. But I think – I think it’s cool. I think you should keep them.” 

Prompto swings right back round from _relieved_ to _incredulous_. “You think it’s _cool_?” 

“I mean, yeah,” Noct says. “I mean – I love cats, you know that.” 

“Yeah, but it’s not like I’m a real cat, like cute and cuddly or whatever. I’m not – I’m not human and I’m not a cat, so – it’s like the worst of both worlds.” 

Noct raises his hand like he’s reaching out to ruffle Prompto’s hair or something, then pulls it back sharply and sits on it. “You are human,” he says. “You’re human, and you’re a cat, so you’re like – even better than most humans. It’s – man, it’s the opposite of what you said.” 

Prompto can’t quite believe what he’s hearing. “You really – think it’s cool?” 

Noct shrugs. “I said so, didn’t I?”

Prompto tries to digest that. Yeah, OK, so Noct asked him to join the Crownsguard even though he thought he was weird, so he knew that Noct was… tolerant. But the idea that Noct might think his freakishness is _cool_ – it’s like the opposite of everything he’s always thought he understood. 

“Hey, Specs is making lunch,” Noct says. “He sent Gladio out to get you some better coffee, but I think he’s getting jerky, too. So – wanna come downstairs?”

And suddenly – Prompto does. He wants to sit and have lunch with the guys like he has a million times before, like everything’s normal and nothing’s changed. Noct – doesn’t care. He thinks it’s _cool_. So maybe it can be like nothing’s changed, at least for now, at least until he has to leave the house. 

Then he remembers. “Um – there’s these – reporters--” The kitchen window is easy enough to see through for someone on the street, so – no, he can’t go downstairs. 

“Oh, them,” Noct says. “Ignis threatened to revoke their access to the Royal Press Corps, and they left pretty fast.” 

There’s that rush of gratitude again. Prompto thinks he might cry, but then he manages to get ahold of himself. “Great!” he says, going for _peppy_ and landing somewhere just south of _hysterical_. “So – yeah, lunch. I’m starving.” 

He hauls himself to his feet, then helps Noct up. As they’re leaving the room, Noct reaches up and puts a hand on his head, gently petting his ears. It feels – amazing. It feels amazing. Prompto half-closes his eyes and starts to rub against Noct’s hand, then realises that he’s purring. Fuck, no. No. 

“Don’t—” he says, knocking Noct’s hand away. Noct takes a quick step back, and Prompto swallows. “Sorry, I – I don’t – want you to—” 

“Yeah, sorry, man,” Noct says. He shoves his hands in his pockets. “I – yeah, I won’t, then.” 

“OK,” Prompto says. It’s fine. It can just be like it was before, like nothing’s changed. 

It’s fine.

~

Downstairs, Iggy is at the stove while Gladio kicks back with his feet on Prompto’s kitchen table. It’s – actually kind of weird, having them here, in his house. Both of them nod at him when he comes in, but neither of them makes a big deal out of, you know, the fact that he puked and then locked himself in the bathroom like a five-year-old, which Prompto is grateful for. He hops up on the counter, because that’s where he always sits when he’s at home, then realises his mistake and flings himself off again. 

“Um – sorry, Iggy,” he says. 

Ignis gives him a thoughtful look, but doesn’t say anything about the counter thing, which is kinda weird. He’s only ever been actually scary about it once, but he’s never failed to sigh or make some mild comment or just look disappointed before, and any and all of those approaches have been enough to make Prompto want to crawl into a hole and never come out. But this time – nothing. Not even disappointed, just – thoughtful. So that’s weird. 

“Did you take a shower while you were up there?” Gladio asks, then wrinkles his nose. “Guess not.” 

“Haha, thanks, buddy,” Prompto says, slapping Gladio on the shoulder. He does kind of reek, though. But also he’s – hungry. Wow, he’s hungry. Whatever Iggy’s cooking smells amazing and Prompto’s stomach feels like it’s turning inside out in an effort to get closer to the pan. 

“Now, when did you last eat?” Ignis says, like he can hear Prompto’s thoughts. Or maybe – is Prompto drooling? Uh, he might be drooling. Just a little bit. 

“Um…” Prompto tries to remember. “Day before the investment ceremony?” He was too keyed up to eat on the morning of the ceremony itself, and since then he’s been busy hating his life and wanting to die. 

Ignis turns and looks at him sharply. Actually, everyone kind of looks at him sharply. It’s a little disconcerting. 

“Fuck’s sake,” Gladio says. 

“Well, quite,” says Ignis. Then he produces a plate out of nowhere and puts it in front of Prompto. It’s a beautifully arranged slice of some kind of ground meat thing with a tiny amount of sauce and basically nothing else. There are no vegetables at all, which is really not like Iggy. “Try this.” 

“OK,” Prompto says. He picks up his fork and takes a bite. It’s – well, it’s Iggy’s cooking, so it’s amazing, but it’s also different from anything he’s had before. Like, it’s clearly meat of some kind, but it’s – different. 

Also, he’s hungry. He’s so, so hungry. 

“Guess he liked it,” Gladio says, and Prompto looks up to find him smirking, and then looks down at his plate to find it empty. 

“Uh – thanks, Igs,” he says, feeling kind of greedy. He realises for the first time that no-one else has a plate in front of them. “Is – um, did you all eat already? What was that, anyway?” 

“Steak tartare,” Ignis says. “Essentially, raw meat.” 

Prompto stares at him. “...raw?” he says. 

“It occurs to me that you most likely have different nutritional needs from – the majority of people,” Ignis says. “I thought I would try some new approaches to see what works. Did you enjoy it?” 

“Yeah, it was – great,” Prompto says. He’s still stuck on _raw meat_. Gross. Gross, right? How could something so gross be – so tasty? Maybe just because Ignis cooked it. He is a food wizard. But since it was raw, that means he didn’t cook it, so--

“Well, I’m sure you’re still hungry,” Ignis says, and then another plate appears in front of Prompto, this one with fish, a boiled egg, and a couple of asparagus spears. This time, everyone else gets a plate, too, which makes Prompto feel a little less weird, and also the fish is definitely cooked, so that’s helpful, too. Noct, though, doesn’t seem totally happy. 

“Specs, you gave me most of Prompto’s vegetables,” he says, poking disconsolately at the mound of asparagus on his plate. 

“It’s entirely possible that Prompto doesn’t require vegetables for optimum nutrition,” Ignis says. “You, on the other hand, do.” 

“Huh? How is that fair?” Noct glares at Ignis, then at Prompto’s plate. “I might be a cat too, for all you know.”

“While that’s not beyond the realm of possibility, I’m going to require more evidence than simply complaining about vegetables before I’m willing to consider it a mitigating factor.” 

Noct makes a kind of wordless, whining noise, and Prompto feels – normal. Sitting here with the guys, listening to them talk, eating with them like it’s any other day, he can almost forget the weird sensations in his face every time someone makes an abrupt movement, or the way his tail just seems to be moving around by itself behind his chair. 

“So are we training, or what?” Gladio says when everyone’s finished eating and Ignis has clearly decided that no amount of cajoling is going to get Noct to finish his asparagus. 

“Um,” Prompto says. He’d almost forgotten Gladio talking about training before – it seemed so irrelevant, so completely the opposite of everything he wanted at that moment. And it still does. He doesn’t want to learn how to live with his – disability, and he definitely doesn’t want to spend lots of time thinking about it, let alone have Gladio spend lots of time thinking about it. He just wants to forget about it until he can get rid of it. 

“I’m gonna take that as a yes,” Gladio says. 

“Gladio,” Ignis murmurs. 

“What?” Gladio says. “I gave him two days to sulk about it. That’s plenty.” 

“I’m not _sulking_ ,” Prompto says, feeling kind of outraged. “My entire life just got torpedoed!” 

“Sounds like a bullshit excuse to me,” Gladio says. “By the way, your tail’s doing something weird.” 

Prompto glances around and sees his tail’s doing its best to lash back and forth, though the chair back is kind of getting in the way. He looks back to see that Ignis is looking thoughtful and Noct is looking – enchanted. Ugh, why are his friends constantly having inappropriate reactions to the fact that he’s some kind of cat-human monster? Prompto needs better friends. 

“Anyway,” Gladio says, standing up, “I booked out the small gym at the Citadel so we can get some privacy. You coming, or do I have to drag you? Because you know I will.” 

“Fuck,” Prompto mutters. But it doesn’t look like he has a lot of choice. And if no-one’s going to be watching – maybe it would be good to get some exercise, at least. He thinks about going back up to bed, about Noct and the guys leaving and him just – on his own, with his head under the pillow, trying not to think. “Fine,” he says. “But I need, like, a hazmat suit or something.” 

Gladio reaches into the duffel that’s slung in the corner of Prompto’s kitchen. “Got you covered,” he says, holding up a long, baggy black hoodie with a really roomy-looking hood and a pair of sweatpants with a hole cut in the ass. “Literally,” he adds, looking unreasonably pleased with himself. “Tail can go inside the back of the hoodie, no-one will see a thing.”

“Fine,” Prompto says again. He takes the clothes from Gladio and turns for the door. 

“Hey – does that mean you’re not going to get them cut off?” Noct asks. 

Prompto pauses. “No,” he says. He still wants the cat parts gone, but if Gladio’s going to be an ass about it, he might as well learn how to control them in the meantime. “You said you’d help me, right?” 

“Yeah…” Noct says. “I mean, yeah. If that’s what you want.” Prompto doesn’t have to look back at him to know he’s looking disappointed. Fuck, he hates disappointing Noct. But he can’t just – live his entire life to make Noct happy. Probably. 

“May I make a suggestion?” Ignis asks. Prompto glances back. Noct looks disappointed, but Ignis looks – neutral.

“Sure, go ahead,” Prompto says. If anyone can come up with a solution to this, it’s Iggy. 

“Why don’t you give it a little time,” Ignis says. “Surgery is – most likely irreversible. It’s a major decision. Perhaps a transitional period would help make sure you don’t regret it.” 

Prompto’s not going to regret it. But he really wants his friends to be on side with this. He needs them to be with him – all the way, not saying one thing and feeling another. “How much time?” 

“Six months?” Noct says. 

“No,” Prompto says. “No way. A couple weeks at most.” 

“What about a month?” Ignis says, and somehow, even though Prompto literally just said no more than a couple weeks, Ignis sounds so – fucking reasonable that he finds himself nodding. 

“Fine,” he says. “A month. And at the end of that you guys have to go with whatever I say.” 

“Of course,” says Ignis, Noct nodding frantically beside him. Gladio shrugs.

“I’m still gonna say if I think it’s dumb,” he says. “But I’ll do what it takes to get you what you want. And in the meantime you gotta lean in, no bullshit hiding from this.” 

“Right,” Prompto says. He’s pretty sure that’s the best he’s going to get. “Great.” 

“Purrfect,” says Ignis. 

Prompto stares at him. 

“I do apologise,” Ignis says. “I couldn’t quite – help myself.” 

Prompto sighs and goes to take a shower.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, you'll be pleased to hear that once again Thwippersnapple has created [awesome art](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1287199238011498496) for the last chapter, in this case of the scene where Prompto wakes up to discover a Noctis in his room :D It's really pretty and I love seeing visualisations for stuff that was previously just in my head. Amazing! Please go and give the artist some love ♥

Taking a shower is more complicated than Prompto thought. It’s not that Prompto’s ever really _liked_ taking showers – he’s certainly never understood people who spend, like, an hour in there just constantly getting wet or whatever – but he definitely likes being clean, so he’s always accepted it as a necessary evil and perfected his _shower as fast as possible_ technique over long years of practice. He realised it was kind of weird when Noct commented on it once, and since then whenever he’s showered at Noct’s apartment he’s spent an extra fifteen minutes after the shower running the water and sitting on the floor watching it cascade down. Actually, he started doing that at home, too, because it turns out watching water droplets is really kind of an amazing way to pass the time. But the point is that Prompto can deal with showers. It’s not a big deal. Or it wasn’t, until he grew cat parts. 

As soon as Prompto steps under the spray, he realises he has multiple problems. Problem number one is that the water falls straight into his new ears, which is really not fun. Problem number two is that his tail gets wet, and if Prompto thought he disliked being wet before he had a tail, it turns out that was nothing on the exciting new misery that he now gets to experience. But the big problem, the problem that has him stumbling back out of the shower immediately (and promptly falling on his ass), is the way that the water falling on his whiskers seems to short out something in his brain, and it starts screaming at him that SOMETHING IS HAPPENING, SOMETHING IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW, DO SOMETHING, DO SOMETHING!!!!

Prompto sits on the floor and blinks, trying to regain some kind of equilibrium. As soon as he’s out of the spray, his brain quiets down, but the shock of it was so intense that he feels disoriented. He barely hears the knock at the door and doesn’t process what it means at all until Gladio tries to come in and can’t because Prompto’s in the way. 

“Prompto?” Gladio says, sounding kind of muffled through the water in Prompto’s ears – which doesn’t make any sense, because Prompto’s real ears are still working, right? They didn’t stop working just because Prompto got new ears, right? Prompto’s going to – cut off the new ears and he needs his real ears to still work oh damn this is all so messed up--

“Hey,” Gladio says, snapping his fingers in front of Prompto’s face. “You awake in there? What happened?” 

Prompto stares at him, then realises that Gladio is here and also that Prompto is naked. He squeaks and covers his dick with both hands, but Gladio doesn’t even seem to notice, reaching up to turn off the shower then frowning at Prompto, running hands along his shoulders and neck like he’s checking to make sure nothing’s broken. His forearm brushes against Prompto’s whiskers, and Prompto flinches, the burst of proximity information almost painful after the shock of earlier. Gladio pauses and frowns, then very lightly touches one whisker with his forefinger. 

“You feel that?” he says. 

“Yeah,” Prompto says. His voice sounds hoarse. 

Gladio nods. “What’s it feel like?” 

Prompto thinks about how to describe it. “Like – someone shouting in my head,” he says. “I mean – not when you did it just then, but when it’s – uh – when they all go off at once…”

Gladio sits back on his heels, considering Prompto. “Like when you’re in the shower?” he says at last. 

Prompto hunches his shoulders. He can’t even fucking wash himself properly any more. 

Gladio eyes his tail, which is creating a growing puddle on the floor. “Gonna need to rethink, then,” he says. He stands up, looks around the bathroom, then picks up a washcloth, soaks it under the hot tap, and holds it out to Prompto. “Here.” 

“Huh?” Prompto says. 

“I mean, you could lick yourself, but I don’t know if that would pass the Ignis Scientia Hygiene Requirements,” Gladio says. He closes the toilet seat. “Sit here. Use soap. We’ll figure out something for your hair later.” He drops the washcloth in Prompto’s lap, since Prompto’s not about to take his hands away from his crotch right now, then reaches for the door. “You need me to stay?” 

“I – no,” Prompto says. “Thanks. Uh – thanks, Gladio.” 

“No sweat,” Gladio says. “I’ll be outside. Don’t pass out.” 

Prompto nods. He waits till Gladio’s gone, then hauls himself onto the closed toilet and starts cleaning himself with slow, methodical sweeps of the washcloth. And it feels – good. Way better than showering, even before the whole whisker emergency situation. He’s not sure why he never thought about washing himself this way before, except that it’s not the normal way to do things. But – but he’s not going to be normal, now. Not until he can get the cat parts cut off again, anyway. He rinses the cloth, holds it under the hot tap, and then swipes it down his ribs. He guesses that, for the next month, at least, he might have to accept some less normal routines. 

Plus, it really feels great. 

~ 

“OK,” Gladio says, gesturing at the balance beam. “Up you get.”

Prompto stares at the thing. It’s basically a torture device. Every fucking time he’s ever been on one, he’s made a total ass out of himself. Even Cor The Immortal Leonis took pity on him once and told him he could stop. Gladio knows that. He knows that Prompto and the balance beam are mortal enemies. And he knows that Prompto’s balance is even more shot since The Cattening. But there he is, just standing there waiting like he hasn’t just condemned Prompto to an embarrassing falling over incident.

“What, you want an engraved invitation?” Gladio asks. 

Prompto glares at him, then gets on the balance beam. He takes two steps and falls embarrassingly over.

Great. 

Gladio frowns at him. “OK,” he says, like Prompto just did something interesting rather than something incredibly predictable. “Stand there.” 

Prompto stands. Gladio walks around him, staring at him. “Move your tail left,” he says. 

“I – uh – I don’t know how to move it,” Prompto says. He’s been desperately trying to ignore its existence since he acquired it. He can feel that something is _there_ but he doesn’t have a real sense of it like he does of his arms or legs. 

Gladio nods. Then he grabs the tail and pulls it left. 

“Hey!” Prompto says. “You gotta ask a guy before you pull his tail!” 

Gladio smirks at that. “You feel that?” 

“Uh, it is part of my body.” _For now._

“OK,” Gladio says. Then he pulls the tail right. “Feel different?” 

“Fuck, why can’t you just--” Prompto says, but then he understands what Gladio’s trying to do – kind of, anyway – and takes a deep breath. The thing is, he doesn’t want to think about what the tail feels like. He’s been trying to avoid thinking about it for days. But now – now he guesses he can’t really avoid it any more. So he thinks about it. 

“Go left again,” he says once he’s thought about it as much as he can bear. 

Gladio pulls his tail over to the left. Prompto closes his eyes and feels – something, a group of muscles that he didn’t even know he had, lengthening and contracting. 

“Got it?” Gladio says. 

“Uh – maybe?” 

“OK.” Gladio lets go. “Try moving it right.” 

Prompto concentrates on the weird muscles. It’s kinda like – when you’ve done fifty squats and you really have to think about making your muscles do one more. Except you don’t really know exactly how your muscles work. It’s – actually not a great analogy. Anyway, he concentrates on the muscles and tries to get them to do – something.

“Huh,” Gladio says. 

“Did I do it?” 

“Went a little haywire to start off with, but yeah, mostly,” Gladio says. “Try moving it side to side.” 

Prompto does. Gladio makes a non-committal noise. 

“What does it feel like?” he asks, touching the tip of Prompto’s tail. 

“Um – not like – anything?” Prompto says. 

“But you can feel me touching you, right?” 

“Yeah,” Prompto says, “but – I don’t really – like, I know you’re touching the tail, but my brain doesn’t really _know_ it, you know? It can tell you’re touching me, but not where you’re touching me.” 

“Huh,” Gladio says again. Then he grabs Prompto’s tail, about halfway down. Prompto starts and tries to pull away, but Gladio holds the tail firmly and then pulls his hand along it to the tip. “You feel that?” 

“Um, duh,” Prompto says. “I don’t – Can you not do that?” 

Gladio raises his eyebrows. “You want to figure out how to deal with it, or not?” 

“Yeah, but I--” Prompto says. Gladio sighs. 

“I get it,” he says. “It’s weird. Your body doesn’t feel right. I’m trying to help you feel like it’s yours, that’s all. But I’m not gonna touch you if you don’t want me to, so – up to you.” 

Prompto chews his lip. He really just – wishes he could go back to three days ago and – not get linked with the crystal. He wonders how disappointed Noct and Iggy will be if he just says fuck it and goes for the immediate plastic surgery option. He imagines Noct’s disappointed face. 

“Fine,” he says. “Just – warn a guy, would you?” 

“Got it,” Gladio says. “I’m gonna do that again. Think about how it feels.” 

He grabs the tail a little further down this time, and Prompto closes his eyes and pays attention to the sensation. It feels – fine. He doesn’t hate it, apart from the _fuck I don’t want to have a tail_ part. More to the point, he can tell that Gladio’s hand is moving. It’s like – there’s a dim sense of – something taking shape in his mind, that there’s a body part there that exists in space and isn’t just a disembodied set of sensations. 

“Anything?” Gladio asks. 

“Mm,” Prompto says, squeezing his eyes shut. “Do it again.” 

Gladio does. And Prompto – can kind of feel his tail. Which parts are further away from his body and which parts are closer. He can feel Gladio’s hand moving along it. It feels--

Gladio’s hand reaches the tip of Prompto’s tail and he starts again, this time starting all the way at the base, and Prompto--

“Whoa,” Gladio says. “Guess you like that.” 

Prompto tries to say something, but he can’t manage through all the fucking purring.

~

They spend a couple of hours working on it before Prompto really gets anywhere with controlling his tail. Even then, it’s pretty pathetic. 

“It’s not that the muscles aren’t strong enough,” Gladio says. “I’ve seen that thing moving perfectly fine. It’s in here.” He bops Prompto on the forehead with his finger. “This is the muscle that needs to get its shit together.” 

“That’s great, thanks,” Prompto says, rubbing his forehead. “You try growing a new limb and see how you get on.” Although, knowing Gladio, if he grew a tail he’d be fucking pole-vaulting with it within minutes. 

“Yeah, well, feeling sorry for yourself is great and all but it’s not going to help you achieve your fitness goals,” Gladio says, like the smug asshole he is. 

“I hate you,” Prompto mutters. 

“Noted. Now move your tail right.” 

Prompto concentrates. 

“Huh,” Gladio says. “Guess you figured it out.” 

Prompto opens his eyes and glances over his shoulder. The tail is – curved to the right. He stares at it. Then he tries moving it further to the right. 

The tail curls round his body until the tip is in front of Prompto’s nose. 

“Whoa,” Prompto whispers. He hasn’t really – looked at it before. It looks – really soft. 

Gladio grins. “OK, balance beam,” he says. 

“What? Why?” It’s not that Prompto’s feeling a glow of victory, exactly, but he’s definitely feeling more accomplished than he has at any point so far today, and he really doesn’t want to ruin it by falling off the balance beam a-fucking-gain. 

“Because your tail is going to help you balance, genius,” Gladio says. 

Prompto stares at him. “Huh?” 

Gladio frowns. “Don’t you know anything about cats?” 

“I mean – no?” Prompto says. “I don’t really – like cats.” Some cats, anyway. Asshole cats. 

Gladio stares at him in silence for a long moment. Then he points at the balance beam. “Up,” he says. 

Prompto gets up. He takes two steps and wobbles. 

“Use the tail,” Gladio says. “That’s what it’s for.” 

It hadn’t occurred to Prompto that the tail was _for_ anything, apart from making him feel like a total freak. And he really doesn’t know how to use it to help in this situation. And he doesn’t have a lot of space in his brain to think about it because most of his brain is busy freaking out about how he’s about to fall. And--

\--he doesn’t fall. 

“Good,” Gladio says. “Keep going.” 

Prompto takes another step. And another. He almost falls, and then he doesn’t fall. He’s not even really sure what he’s doing, but somehow – his balance still sucks but somehow it’s – better? No, it’s not better, it’s just that he’s saving himself at the last minute. Somehow. With the tail, according to Gladio. Fuck, this is weird. 

He steps off the end of the balance beam and then turns around to stare at it. He’s never made it all the way to the end. Not once, not ever. He – doesn’t know how he did that. 

“Having a tail ain’t all bad, huh?” Gladio says, slapping him on the back. 

And Prompto – really wants to disagree, but maybe--

But maybe he doesn’t completely disagree. 

~

By the time Gladio finally agrees to end the torture session at the gym, Prompto is exhausted. He’s also made it across the balance beam without falling a total of three times. OK, not three consecutive times, but given that his previous total of times he’s made it across the balance beam without falling is a big fat zero, he feels pretty good about it. 

Gladio slaps him on the back and beams. “Gonna have you doing handstands on that thing in no time,” he says. He looks – genuinely happy. Prompto doesn’t think anyone’s ever looked genuinely happy while observing his balance beam performance before. Or even insincerely happy. He’s not convinced about the handstands, but maybe he could get to the point where he can walk down the street without tripping over his own feet, like a normal human being. 

Gladio gives Prompto a ride back to his house. When they walk in, they find Ignis busy at the stove and Noct snoozing on the couch. 

“Ah, good,” Ignis says. “I’m making dinner.” 

Noct stirs at that and opens one eye, then sits up a little. “How was the gym?” 

“Um,” Prompto says. “Why are you guys still in my house?” 

Noct shrugs. “Don’t have anything else to do today.” 

“Yeah, but--” Prompto says. “You could – hang out at your house.” Noct’s apartment is so much nicer than his house – not that his house is unpleasant, it’s just not _Crown Prince of Lucis_ levels of plush. 

“Sure, I could,” Noct says. He stretches and yawns. “How was the gym?” 

“Blondie’s starting to get the hang of the tail thing,” Gladio says. “It’s helping a lot with the balance.” He sounds – almost proud. Wow. Weird. 

“I figured,” Noct says. 

“Huh?” Prompto stares at him. “You figured? How did you figure?”

Noct looks a little confused. “Because – cats balance with their tails? So when you got a tail I figured – that’s probably why your balance has always been – uh – a little off.” 

Prompto stares at him. How come Noct knew that cats balance with their tails? OK, so Noct like cats – including asshole cats, unfortunately – but – did everyone know that? He looks around at Iggy and Gladio. 

“Did you all think that?” 

Gladio shrugs. Ignis glances up from his cooking. “It did seem to make a great deal of sense,” he says. 

“Oh,” Prompto says. “Huh.” Since he got becatted, he’s been basically stuck in a low-grade panic, ramping up to high-grade panic from time to time. He hasn’t had space in his mind to think about how any of this cat stuff might relate to him being – super weird in general. But apparently everyone else has. It occurs to him that maybe he ought to do some research on cats. 

“Wait, what?” Noct says, sitting up sharply, and Prompto tunes back into the conversation Noct and Gladio are having. Noct turns to stare at him, then looks back at Gladio. He looks betrayed. Prompto wonders what the hell Gladio just said. 

“In a professional capacity,” Gladio says, looking smug. 

“But—” Noct says. “So – does that mean I get to touch Prompto’s tail?” He gives Prompto a look that’s all pleading eyes.

“Noctis,” Ignis says from the kitchen, sounding exasperated. 

“Yeah, I--” Noct says, then subsides into the couch. “I know,” he says. “Sorry.” 

“He purrs when you touch the base of it,” Gladio says. 

“Hey!” Noct and Prompto say in unison. 

In the kitchen, Ignis sighs. 

~

That evening, there’s a brief moment where it looks like Noct might insist on staying overnight on the couch – which will mean that at least one of Ignis or Gladio will have to stay over, too, given the complete lack of security measures at Prompto’s house, and Prompto only has one couch – but Prompto finally manages to persuade him to go back to his own apartment. He tries to convince himself that he feels bad about the whole thing, about them wasting their time hanging out here in Prompto’s boxy, not-entirely-clean house, but actually he feels – pretty good. He definitely feels a hell of a lot better than he did this morning. He heads to his room, planning to do some research on cat stuff on his phone, lies down on the bed, picks his phone up, and falls asleep. 

When Prompto wakes up, it’s early. He spends a few minutes lying in bed, trying to move his tail around, then he goes to take a washcloth-bath. He does some experimenting with the sink and more or less manages to wash his hair without it being too unpleasant of an experience. Then he goes to do some research. Before searching for cat information sites, though, he checks his ChocoChat account, and just around the point where he’s remembering he deleted it, he notices a trending hashtag.

_#teamcatboy_

He stares at it for a moment. It could be something else, right? It could be related to – something else. Even if it isn’t, he really should just – close the page and get on with pretending that all this stuff is happening in a bubble, because if he taps on it and it turns out to be about what he thinks it might be about, then he’s going to have to deal with that, and he’s not sure he can deal with that--

He taps on it. 

The page is suddenly full of Chats. He scrolls quickly down, trying to get a sense of what they’re discussing. Five Chats down, he comes across an image. It’s not great quality, especially on his phone screen, but he recognises the throne room, the crowd of Crownsguard, the King up there on the throne. And himself, kneeling. Noctis, grabbing his shoulders. There’s no text in the Chat, just two hashtags: 

_#investmentgoals #teamcatboy_

Prompto stares at it. Then he starts looking at some of the other Chats. 

_And I thought the standard-issue Crownsguard were hot! #teamcatboy_

_Where are we on the #argentis tinhatting? Has the #teamcatboy incident affected the integrity of the tinfoil?_

_how much would you pay to see him chase his tail tho #teamcatboy_

_I always begged my parents for a cat as a kid and now I realise I wasn’t thinking big enough. #teamcatboy_

_Impressionable teenagers throwing #teamcatboy around like this is all a Game and not a twisted mockery of Nature are everything that’s wrong with our Nation today. #teamhumanity_

Prompto stares at the last Chat for a long time. Then he taps on it, feeling kind of sick with dread. There are over 500 replies, only about 45 likes. The first reply is _You’d probably be less filled with hate if you had an adorable catboy to cuddle_ 😻 _#teamcatboy_

Prompto closes the page. He turns off his phone. Then he stares at it for a long moment. Shit. _Shit_.

Downstairs, he hears the front door open. 

He sits bolt upright, heart in his throat. His parents aren’t due back for months. And people – people are talking about him. He’s _trending_ on ChocoChat. All those reporters found out where he lived, so it can’t be that hard. What if #teamhumanity decided to come around and fix the problem?

He swallows, listening hard. He hears the sound of two – no, three – people trying to walk as quietly as possible. Then he hears a familiar voice murmur, “Highness, I really do think we should have called first.” 

Prompto sags back in his chair, feeling sick with relief. Oh, yeah. Now he remembers who else has a key – or at least, a way of getting in. Also, he heard Ignis murmur from a different room on a different floor. Prompto’s house isn’t exactly soundproof, but still. He reaches up and touches the tip of one of his new ears. It swivels under his finger. Huh. 

He gets up and goes downstairs. Ignis and Noct are in the kitchen, having a whispered argument. Gladio is slouched on the couch, looking at his phone. 

“Hi,” Prompto says. “You’re in my house.” 

Noct freezes and then looks round at him. “We were quiet, though,” he says. 

“His Highness was concerned about waking you,” Ignis says. “Otherwise we would have called.” He shoots Noct a glare. 

“It’s not that early,” Prompto says. 

“That’s what I said,” Gladio says, without looking up from his phone. “Some of us get up before noon.” 

“Right,” Prompto says. He feels awkward. He’s not even sure why the guys are here. Noct is the prince, surely he has better things to do than break into Prompto’s house every day. 

“So there’s something--” Noct starts, at the same time as Prompto says, “Have you guys checked ChocoChat today?” 

They stare at each other. Ignis sighs. Gladio looks pissed off. 

“You’ve seen it, then?” Noct says. 

Prompto thinks about just going back to bed. Then he thinks about whether he’s going to need to move house. Maybe change his name. 

Ignis clears his throat. “I’ve had security placed on the street,” he says. “Nothing overt. It’s unlikely that any of your detractors – or your admirers, for that matter – will go beyond foolish comments on ChocoChat, but better safe than sorry.”

Prompto sits down heavily on the stairs. He has detractors. And admirers, apparently. He really doesn’t want either of those things right now. 

Noct comes and sits on the floor at the bottom of the stairs. “Hey,” he says. “It’ll be fine. You’ll get used to it.” 

“How would you know?” Prompto asks.

“You think I don’t know anything about unwanted attention?” Noct says. 

Prompto stares at him. “Oh,” he says. “Yeah. Good point.” 

“I know it’s not the same,” Noct says, “but I’ll help you, OK? Just – let me help you.” 

Prompto wonders if he’s going to cry. No, he decides. He’s not going to cry. He’s not going to be an ass to Noct. He promised Noct a month, so he’s going to give him a month, and then he’s going to the surgeon and he can forget all this ever happened to him. A month. It’s not that long. 

“Thanks, bud,” he says. 

Noct nods. “Any time.”

~

Later, when Gladio’s out for a run and Noct is napping in Prompto’s bed, Prompto finds Ignis sitting at the kitchen table, a sheaf of papers in front of him and a can of Ebony at his elbow.

“Um, hey,” he says, standing awkwardly in the doorway. “You, uh – you got a minute?” 

Ignis looks up. “Of course,” he says, gesturing to a chair, like it’s his office and not Prompto’s kitchen. Prompto sits down, adjusting his tail a couple times until it’s reasonably comfortable. Then he takes his list out of his pocket, spreads it out on the table and takes a deep breath.

“Could you, uh – look at this for me?” he says, holding it out to Ignis. There’s a part of him that’s screaming at him to stop, because he’s always, always been terrified that someone might find the list and figure out that he’s a freak. But Ignis already knows he’s a freak, so – so there’s no point hiding it any more. 

Ignis takes the list, glances down it quickly, then frowns and starts reading it more carefully. Prompto tells himself he’s definitely not going to be sick. Nope. That would be gross, and he can’t be gross in front of Ignis. 

When he’s done reading, Ignis moves his sheaf of papers out of the way and spreads the list out on the table in front of him. “Did you write this, or did someone write it for you?” he asks. 

“I wrote it,” Prompto says. 

“There are several different types of handwriting,” Ignis says, in that super-neutral tone he uses when he doesn’t want anyone to know that he’s pissed. Shit, Iggy is pissed. Ignis Scientia, the one person in the world that Prompto really doesn’t want to piss off. 

“Um, I – I started it before I really got the hang of writing,” Prompto says. 

Ignis looks at him. Prompto feels like the back of his tongue has frozen to his throat. Wow. Iggy’s really pissed. 

“These are things that people told you not to do?” 

“Um,” Prompto says. “Um.” Oh yeah, he sounds really smart right now. “I – they’re things I realised were – weird. There were – a lot of them so I – needed a list--” 

Ignis looks back down at the list. “I see.” 

“I – sorry, Iggy, I didn’t mean – I just wanted to ask--” Wow, he really wishes he’d never had the bright idea of showing Ignis his list. Fuck, he’s really fucked up. 

Ignis frowns. “Sorry? What are you sorry about?” Then he shakes his head. “What did you want to ask me?” 

“I just – I wanted to know if any of these are – cat things,” Prompto says. He’s been thinking about it since yesterday, since it turned out that everyone except him knew that his balance thing was because of the tail. And it can be fixed. So maybe if the other things are cat things as well – maybe they can be fixed? For the first time in his life, he regrets not spending more time around cats.

Ignis looks down the list again. “Yes, the majority, if not all, are things I would associate with cats,” he says. He frowns. “You don’t have anything about the box on here?” 

“The box?” Prompto asks. “Why would I--” He stops. “Wait – Iggy, wait – is it – _weird_ to sit in a box?” 

“Not at all,” Ignis says. “If you’re a cat.” 

Prompto stares at him. Then he puts a hand over his mouth. Shit. Shit, why did nobody _tell him?_

“You didn’t tell me,” he whispers, once he’s managed to get ahold of himself. 

Ignis’ face has lost that _I am not-so-secretly pissed_ look – thank fuck – and now he just looks – really sad for some reason. He reaches out and puts a hand on Prompto’s arm. “Prompto,” he says, gesturing at the list. “These things – none of these things matter. You could do all of these things every day and none of us would stop caring about you.”

“Huh?” comes a voice from the doorway. Prompto looks round and sees Noct, scratching his dishevelled hair and giving Ignis a sleepy look. “What things?” 

“Noct, how do you feel about Prompto’s box?” Ignis asks. 

Noct shrugs, heading for the fridge. “He likes it, so.” He glances over his shoulder at Prompto. “You still like it, right?” 

Prompto thinks about the box. He wishes he had a box at home, too. But – it’s a cat thing. He didn’t even know. He didn’t even know it was weird, let alone that it was specifically cat-weird. He swallows. “Yeah, I like it,” he says, half in a whisper. 

“Then I like it, too,” Noct says. He leans against the counter, frowning. “Huh,” he says. “It’s a cat thing. I never thought about it.” Then he smiles a little, like somehow he likes it even more now he knows it’s a cat thing. “What are you guys reading, anyway?” 

Ignis folds the list up without any obvious haste. “I was reading the introduction to a report about the sewage problems in the eastern districts,” he says. “You’re welcome to look, if you want.” 

Noct makes a face. “Thanks, but no thanks,” he says, wandering out into the living room. 

Ignis holds out the folded up list, and Prompto takes it and shoves it in his pocket. Then Ignis reaches out, like he’s about to touch Prompto’s head. He pauses, though, hand in mid-air, then subsides back into his chair. 

“So – is there a way I can fix any of that?” Prompto asks. “Like with the balance thing?” 

Ignis looks at him in silence. Then he takes off his glasses and cleans them. 

“I don’t consider that any of it needs to be fixed,” he says. “The balance issue was because of a missing body part. All the rest is – part of your personality, no matter how much you may have been pretending otherwise for much of your life.” 

Prompto deflates. “Oh,” he says. It kind of makes sense, but he – he really wants--

“Prompto, nobody who cares about you will mind in the least if you do the things on the list,” Ignis says. “In fact, I suspect Noctis might even prefer it. We would all prefer it, since it would mean you were being more true to yourself. Apart from sitting on the counter, of course. You should still refrain from doing that.” 

“Got it,” Prompto says, not really listening. “No counter-sitting.” Maybe Iggy’s wrong, though. If the tail can fix his balance, then maybe--

\--wait. Oh, wait. If it’s the tail that fixes his balance, then if he gets the tail cut off again, his balance is going to be fucked. Shit. _Shit_ , why didn’t he think of that? 

“Prompto?” Ignis asks. “Are you all right?” 

“Yeah,” Prompto manages. “Yeah, I – I just gotta--” He lurches to his feet and heads up the stairs, tripping at the top just like he always fucking does because he’s a clumsy idiot and he doesn’t have to be, he doesn’t have to be clumsy but he can’t not be clumsy and not be a cat at the same time. He makes it into his room and closes the door, sinking down to sit with his back against it. Maybe – maybe it’s not that important? Maybe it’s not that bad, being clumsy. He’s dealt with it his whole life. It’s not a big deal. It’s not like he’s not used to it. 

But. He thinks about Gladio, looking happy for him when he managed not to fall off the balance beam. He thinks about how he felt, how good it felt, to get it right for once, to be – normal. Better. The tail made him better. 

He concentrates and manages to curl the tail around so that it’s in front of his face. It’s ginger and kind of fluffy. It doesn’t really look like much. He doesn’t know what the fuck to do with it. 

“What am I going to do with you?” he asks. 

But the tail doesn’t answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I totally stole "cattening" and some of the consequences of Showering While Cat from the very inventive Eleke :D


	6. I ran out of cat puns after four, OK? I'm no Ignis Scientia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Helloooo out there! If you were looking for some adorable art of catboy Prompto, look no further! Thwippersnapple has pulled it out of the bag yet again, this time with a pic of [Prompto and his mortal enemy, the balance beam](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1303906229987586048). Go Prompto! We all believe in you! And please give the artist some love ♥

The next day, Noct has to do some prince stuff and can’t come round and break into Prompto’s house like he usually does. Gladio texts Prompto to tell him he’s got a window in his schedule mid-afternoon and he’s coming by to take him to the gym, _no arguments_ , but other than that, Prompto’s at a loose end. He’s still got four days before he’s supposed to go see Marshal Leonis for another conversation about his future as a Crownsguard – fuck, he is not looking forward to that – and between now and then – he’s not sure. He guesses he’ll just – do nothing?

Doing nothing, as it turns out, is pretty boring. Prompto’s not as miserable as he was a couple days ago, which means he’s not as willing to just lie in bed and hide his head under the pillow. He doesn’t want to futz around online because, well, that’s where #teamcatboy and #teamhumanity live, Noct isn’t free to play King’s Knight with him because apparently whatever prince stuff he’s got today actually requires him to be paying attention, and there aren’t even journalists knocking on his door every five minutes to keep him on his toes. 

Huh. No journalists. 

Prompto drops into a crouch and crawls across the floor of his room, then peeks over the lower edge of the window. The street is empty, a few fallen leaves swirling in the breeze. Prompto watches them. He hates this time of year – it’s so difficult to stop himself from jumping on leaves in public. Still. The street’s empty. No journalists – no anyone at all. So – OK. OK. 

Prompto puts on the baggy hoodie Gladio brought him and manages to arrange his tail so that it’s inside the back of the thing. It’s – not really comfortable, but on the other hand, when he looks in the mirror, it’s not obvious that he has a tail at all. If you knew what to look for, maybe you’d notice the back of the hoodie seems kind of – bulky, but that could be anything. He flips the hood up and--

\--well. There’s the whiskers. Not much he can do about them, short of cutting them off. He thinks about it, even fetches a pair of scissors, but the moment he grabs a couple to hold them still while he cuts them, his whole nervous system starts yelling at him and he has to let go. He imagines actually cutting them and his eyes start watering. So…

So. Maybe if he just… pulls the hood forward enough, no-one will notice. 

He looks out the window. The sky is blue, with high, white clouds. He can just tell it’s the best kind of day, cool and windy, the kind of day that would be his favourite if it didn’t so often come with fallen leaves blowing around. He chews his lip. 

Fuck it.

Prompto makes it out the door and halfway down the street before his _fuck it_ starts to turn into _oh shit what if?_ He bites down on his cheek and forges on. It’s so nice out here. It’s so nice to be outside, breathing in the air and all the fall smells. He’s gonna – go to the park and take pictures. It’ll be great. If he stays away from everyone, no-one will notice his whiskers. 

And – no-one does. The park isn’t too busy this time of day on a weekday, and Prompto slips through the trees, staying well away from everyone wherever possible and keeping his head down when it isn’t. No-one even looks twice at him. Thank fuck for big-city unfriendliness. 

He takes a bunch of pictures of sunlight through the leaves, the red of fallen maple leaves against the grey of the ornamental gravel garden, even gets some of the huge fish in the larger of the two ponds to show to Noct. He feels – kind of OK. Maybe. Then a gaggle of teenage girls comes over the bridge towards him, and he steps back, off the path, slipping behind one of the huge rocks to wait for them to pass. Only they don’t. Instead, they stop on the path just on the other side of the rock. 

“Oh em gee,” one of them says. “Where did you get those?”

“They’re selling them on eCactuar,” one of the others says. “They’re sold out, though, I checked this morning.” 

“I am so signing up for updates for when they get new stock!” the first girl says. “They’re so lifelike!” 

Prompto peers around the rock, wondering when they’re gonna move on, and sees – cat ears. They’re all wearing cat ears. As he stares, one of them grins and says, “Yeah, well, you may have the best ears, but take a look at this.” 

She unzips her hoodie and pulls it open to reveal a white t-shirt emblazoned with the word _#teamcatboy_ in pink. 

The girls make a variety of shrieking noises and Prompto – makes a strategic exit. OK, fine, he runs away. Unfortunately that means he has to fight his way through a bamboo hedge, which isn’t good for him or for the bamboo, and he falls flat on his face at least twice, but at least he gets as far away from #teamcatboy as possible. He keeps running till he finds a corner of the park with no-one in it, and then he puts his back against a tree and covers his eyes with his arm. 

“Fuck,” he whispers. He wonders if it’s possible to just – nuke ChocoChat from orbit. Or go back in time. Or erase everyone’s memories. Or – cut off all these stupid cat parts. Fuck. 

He hears giggling in the distance and watches from behind the tree as the group of girls wanders across the grass. They’re far enough away that even with his new hearing he can’t hear what they’re saying, just the general tone of excitement and hilarity. They’re seriously _all_ wearing cat ears. Prompto wants to die. Or, like, to go over there and shake them and tell them that there’s no fucking _team_. There’s just him. Him, the only one, the only fucking part-cat freak in the whole of Insomnia, maybe the whole world. There’s no fucking team. 

His phone buzzes and he pulls it out to see a bunch of messages on the group chat he has with Noct, Iggy and Gladio. 

**Noct:** Fuck, this is boring. I can’t believe you made me come to this, Specs

 **Ignis:** Well, I apologise that running a kingdom isn’t a thrill a minute.

 **Noct:** Apology not accepted

 **Noct:** Can we at least start inviting Prompto to these things? He’s in my retinue now, right?

 **Gladio:** You remembered he’s got a few things of his own going on right now, right?

 **Noct:** Yeah, but I mean once we’ve got that figured out

There’s a short gap in the timestamps after that, then another message from Noct.

 **Noct:** OK, fine. Prompto, you OK?

Another gap. 

**Noct:** Prompto?

A gap. Then the message that made his phone buzz.

 **Gladio:** Hey, #teamcatboy, you remembered I’m picking you up in half an hour, right? 

Prompto stares at the message until his eyes get blurry. 

Then he goes home to wait for Gladio.

~

After that, things go downhill. 

Prompto trips over his own feet on the way back to his house and lands hard on his hands and knees, tearing the knee of the sweatpants that aren’t even his. It’s weird, because, OK, he’s always been clumsy, but usually he’s pretty good at catching himself before he falls and landing on his feet. But somehow today – or at least, since he saw the girls with the cat ears – he’s even worse than usual, and he starts to dread the gym because he knows Gladio’s going to make him do the balance beam thing. By the time he gets back to the house, he’s starting to think maybe he’ll just – pretend not to be in when Gladio arrives. He really doesn’t want to deal with Gladio and his can-do attitude right now. Prompto is definitely feeling pretty can’t-don’t. 

The problem, though, is that Gladio hammers on the door like the house is burning down and then, when Prompto doesn’t immediately appear, yells, “Hey, team catb--” at the bedroom window, which has Prompto – sitting at the bottom of the stairs debating whether to hide – lunging for the door before he can finish. 

“Huh, you are there,” Gladio says, like he hasn’t just been yelling Prompto’s issues all over the fucking street. “You ready, or what?” 

Prompto stares at him. He – kind of wants to punch him. Or, no, actually, he wants to hiss at him and maybe scratch his cheek. Is that weird? He tries to remember if he’s ever seen a person do something like that. He wonders whether, if he asked really nicely, Ignis would write him a detailed catalogue of every single thing that human beings who aren’t part-cat do so he could check. 

Gladio raises his eyebrows. “You OK?” 

Prompto flips his hood up and pushes past Gladio, stalking towards the waiting car. Up above, the sky is still blue and cool and the wind is still fresh. But Prompto’s really not feeling it any more. 

~

It turns out Prompto was right: Gladio does make him do the balance beam thing again. The first couple of tries, Prompto just falls off, like nothing’s changed, but on the third try – with Gladio yelling _just use the tail, blondie, come on_ – something changes. He’s not even really thinking about it – too busy glaring at Gladio – and he just… walks across the beam. He doesn’t even realise he’s done it until he’s at the other end and Gladio is striding over to slap him on the back. Even that doesn’t knock Prompto down – he wobbles, but he manages to get back upright. 

“Chalk one up for #teamcatboy,” Gladio says. 

And Prompto – is suddenly really pissed off.

“Fuck you,” he says to Gladio, and gets down off the beam, stalking to the locker rooms without giving Gladio any time to answer. Once he gets there, he flings himself down on a bench and glares at the floor. He’s aware that he’s just been pretty much an asshole to Gladio, and that makes him even more mad, somehow. 

A couple seconds later, Gladio appears in the doorway. He leans against the doorframe, arms folded.

“So did I do something, or am I just collateral damage?” he says. 

“Leave me alone,” Prompto mutters, because hey, he’s already being an asshole so he might as well keep on that way. 

Gladio leans in silence for a moment, then stands up and comes over to the bench. He sits down not quite next to Prompto and leans back against the bank of lockers. 

“Nah,” he says. “Got your name in my schedule for the next hour, so I guess I’m just gonna sit here and watch you sulk.” 

Prompto lets out a growl and drops his head, grabbing at his hair. Well, trying to grab at his hair, except there are fucking _ears_ there now, and he grabs one of them by mistake and it turns out to be a lot more sensitive than hair. Fuck. Also, ow. 

“I fucking _hate_ this,” he says. He kind of sounds like a five year old – an asshole five year old – but fuck. He fucking hates this. 

“Yeah, I’m getting that.” Gladio taps his fingers on his knee for a minute. “So, did you hate getting across the balance beam without falling?” 

Prompto grinds his teeth. Gladio waits. Prompto decides to see how long he can stay on the _asshole five year old_ kick and doesn’t answer. Because – because no, he didn’t hate it. And that – that makes things even worse, because he didn’t hate it, but if he wants to be able to do it for longer than the next few weeks he needs to keep the tail and he can’t – he _can’t_. He can’t live like this forever. 

Gladio sighs. “You know, Noct’s pretty worried about you,” he says. “Iggy, too.” 

“They’re the ones who made me do this whole trial month thing in the first place.”

“Right,” says Gladio. “Because they didn’t want you to do anything you might regret before you had a chance to really think about it.” 

“I thought about it!” Prompto says. “I already knew what I wanted! I already – I already know what I want.” 

“OK.” Gladio shrugs. “Well, you’ll still get to do that at the end of the month, so, what, you’re just gonna keep feeling sorry for yourself until then? That’s gonna get old pretty fast.” 

“Why are you so--” Prompto says, but he can’t finish because he really – he doesn’t want to be yelling at Gladio. He wants to just go back to bed and pretend like this day never happened. Except he also wants to go and do the balance beam again, to see if he can. And maybe try some of the other shit that he was always terrible at, like stuff on the vaulting horse. Because maybe now – because maybe--

He stands up. “I’m going home.” 

“Whoa, hey.” Gladio stands up, too. “What about training?” 

“Guess you’ve got some time off,” Prompto says, already heading for the door. He needs to get out of here before he starts crying. He doesn’t want Gladio to see him cry. But Gladio’s following him like he can’t take a hint – which, OK, Prompto knows Gladio pretty well and he definitely can’t take a hint, at least when the hint is _I actually don’t want to work out right now_ – and Prompto’s eyes are already getting blurry. 

“So, what, you’re just gonna walk home?” Gladio says. “Thought you didn’t want to attract any attention.” 

“Well it’s not like a have a _fucking choice_ ,” Prompto says, and then the tears spill over and he turns to face away from Gladio and tries really hard to make it look like he’s not crying, which is hard because swiping at your eyes is kind of a dead giveaway. 

There’s silence for a second. Then Gladio puts a hand on his shoulder. It’s almost tentative, nothing like his usual slaps and punches at all. 

“I’ll drive you,” he says. 

Prompto takes a deep breath and digs the heel of his hand into his right eye. 

“Thanks,” he mutters.

~

When they get back to his house, the lights are on downstairs. Prompto stares at them, wondering if he left them on, or if – maybe his parents are back? He feels a sudden rush of fear. What are his parents going to think? He can’t – he can’t see them, how is he going to explain?

“Hey,” Gladio says behind him. “You just gonna stand in the street all day?”

So Prompto goes up the path and opens the door, breath caught in his throat, and--

“Ah, you’re back,” says Ignis.

Prompto stands in the entrance hall and stares. Ignis is in his kitchen. Why is Ignis in his house? 

“Why—” he starts, and then Noct appears from the living room.

“Hey, great, you’re here,” he says. “How was training?” 

“Um,” Prompto says, but Noct’s already grabbing his hand and pulling him through to the living room.

“Specs said your food’s no good, so he’s making an inventory,” he says. “Anyway – I got you this.” 

He gestures at the corner of the room. There’s a box there. It’s a big box. Big enough to sit in. 

“I didn’t have time to get Iris to decorate it,” Noct says. 

Prompto stares at the box in silence. Behind him, he’s aware of Gladio and Ignis talking quietly in the kitchen. He can hear what they’re saying, even though he shouldn’t be able to. They’re talking about him. Everyone’s talking about him, the internet and the girls in the park and the journalists and his _friends_ \--

Gladio comes into the living room. “Nice box, teamcatboy,” he says, and Prompto just--

“There’s no team!” he says, spinning to face Gladio. “There’s no fucking _team_ , and why are you guys even in my house? Why can’t you just—” 

He chokes on what he’s saying and then stops saying anything. There’s a silence. He doesn’t look at any of the guys, doesn’t want to see their expressions. “I’m going to bed,” he mumbles.

No-one calls after him as he heads up the stairs. And Prompto tells himself he’s OK with that.

~

The problem with having two sets of ears, one of which is super sensitive, is that even if you’ve stormed upstairs to your bedroom like a tween, you can still hear what people are saying downstairs. Prompto lies on his front on his bed and tries really hard not to listen, but--

“I don’t know, he was already pretty pissed when I picked him up,” Gladio’s saying. “Not sure I’ve ever seen him so, what, sullen? That’s usually Noct’s job.” 

“Hey! We’re not talking about me,” Noct says. 

“Makes a change.”

“If we could all just focus--” Iggy says, and then Prompto sticks his fingers in his ears. The problem is, there’s a whole other set of ears. He tries sticking his fingers in those ones instead, but they’ve got these weird hairs that makes it pretty uncomfortable. Finally, he settles for sticking his head under the pillow and humming to himself. Maybe the guys will leave soon and he can feel sorry for himself in peace.

That’s not what happens, though. What happens is – nothing, for a while. The house starts to smell amazing, which means Iggy, at least, is still in the kitchen. And then there’s a knock at the door. Prompto considers telling whoever it is to go away, but he’s starting to feel like maybe he’s done with _asshole five year old_ , so he sighs, sits up, and says, “Yeah?” 

The door opens. It’s Noct. He comes in and sits on the floor, even though there’s perfectly good chairs available. 

“Sorry about the box,” he says. “I thought you’d like it.”

Prompto – wants to cry. “No, man, shit,” he says. “That was – it was – I do like it. I just--” 

Noct sits and waits. But Prompto doesn’t know what to say. He wants to tell Noct how grateful he is to have someone who cares enough about him to get him a box even though sitting in a box is weird. And he wants to tell him to please, please leave him alone because everything sucks so bad and he just wants to sleep for the next five years and not talk to anyone ever again. But he doesn’t want to tell Noct any of those things. He doesn’t want to talk at all. 

“So – you really think there’s no team?” Noct says. 

“Huh?” Prompto stares at him. “I mean – if you know of any other cat-human monsters out there, you gotta let me know, man, because being in a team of one really sucks.” 

“That’s not what I--” Noct says, then shakes his head. “You’re not a monster.” He waits, then when Prompto doesn’t say anything, he says, “Gladio says you did the balance beam with no issues today. He’s pretty proud.” 

Prompto closes his eyes a moment. He wants Gladio to be proud of his performance at training – he’s wanted that ever since he first started training with Gladio – but he hates what it means, that he can do the balance beam and make Gladio proud now because of what he is. What it’ll mean about how Gladio feels about him once the month is past and he goes back to something approximating normal. The mixture of the two emotions in his chest feels like physical pain. 

“Prompto?” Noct says. “You OK?” 

“I just – don’t want to be a cat,” Prompto says. He opens his eyes again. He just wants Noct to understand without him having to explain it. He doesn’t know how to explain it. 

“But being a cat made you better at balancing,” Noct says. “So – I mean, that’s great. Isn’t it?” 

It is great. It’s really great. And it’s also really fucking awful.

“There were these girls in the park today,” Prompto says. He wants to get Noct to understand, and he doesn’t know how, but maybe if he tells Noct about the girls he’ll get it. “They were all wearing cat ears, like it’s some kind of game. Like – everybody’s talking about me like I’m not even a person, just a character in a video game or something. And it’s going to be like that, even when I get rid of all this, people are still going to know. They’re going to know I’m not – not like them.” 

Noct stares at him for a moment. Then he gives a one-shouldered shrug. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s hard. But, like – what if you got the highest score ever on Justice Monsters V, or beat Gilgamesh in a fight, or invented a new kind of phone or something? Everyone would talk about you then, too, but it would be cool, right?” 

Prompto frowns. “But that’s – not the same thing.” 

“What, you’ve never seen someone cosplaying as Cor?” Noct says. 

Prompto swallows, because not only has he seen people cosplaying as Cor the Immortal, he’s cosplayed as Cor the Immortal himself, as Noct damn well knows since he was there at the time. Not the Prompto did it where Cor could see him or ever get hold of any pictures, but…

“But he’s the Immortal,” he says. “Like – OK, (a) holding your own against Gilgamesh is not the same as having cat ears, and (b) he doesn’t give a shit about what people think, anyway.”

“Yeah,” Noct says. “So – maybe try (b) for a while, see how it goes?” 

“Like it’s that easy.” 

Noct shrugs. Then he sighs. “OK, maybe it’s not easy, but – I hate how this is eating you up. And you’re right – you can’t go back, not even if you decide to get the surgery. So, I mean – what other choices do you have?” 

Prompto stares at him. “Shit,” he says. Because Noct’s right. There’s really no going back. And it wasn’t like Prompto didn’t know that – shit, he’s the one who said it to Noct first – but having someone else say it back to him is – fuck. He feels like he’s eaten a chunk of ice. 

“But then,” he says, voice sounding a little strangled. “But then – once I’ve had the surgery, people will forget after a while, right? So – maybe it can’t be exactly like it was before, but – maybe it won’t be so bad?” 

“I just – I don’t get why you want to go back to how it was before,” Noct says. “Like – you said you’ve been trying to hide all this stuff for years, pretending to be someone you’re not. I mean – isn’t that hard? Why would you want to go back to that when you could just be yourself?” 

“What if I don’t want to be myself?” Prompto asks. 

Noct just looks at him. He looks – really sad. Prompto didn’t want to make Noct sad. Prompto’s just spent the entire day making his friends feel bad in different ways. He should really just – not talk to anyone any more. Maybe ever. 

“I mean, have you ever tried it, though?” Noct says at last. 

“Huh?” Prompto’s gone a pretty long way down the path of _maybe just join a monastery and take a vow of silence?_ , and it takes him a second to reorient himself. “Tried what?” 

“Being yourself.” Noct’s watching him in this intense way that kind of makes Prompto’s skin prickle. “Because, like – I don’t think you can say you don’t want to do something if you’ve never tried it. And – I really like yourself. The bits you’ve let me see, anyway. So maybe you’ll end up liking yourself, too. Or it’ll make you feel better, anyway.” 

“No, I – I can’t,” Prompto says. Even after all this, Noct still doesn’t get it. 

“Why? What are you afraid is going to happen?” 

Prompto thinks about the things he’s been afraid of all his life – that people will stare, that they’ll talk about him behind his back – or even in front of his face – that his friends will realise they don’t want to be seen with him. The first two are already happening anyway, so--

“What if it turns out you don’t like the real me after all?” 

And Noct – laughs. Not like a _wow, you’re hilarious_ kind of laugh, but more an incredulous, astonished kind of laugh. “Never gonna happen,” he says. And there’s this – certainty, this absolute confidence there that makes Prompto suddenly think that maybe – that maybe--

Noct leans forward, face intent. “Listen, OK. I know we already made a deal about giving it a month, but if you’re just fighting it all the time then obviously it’s going to feel bad. So – maybe you can just – stop fighting? Like, not even all the time, just sometimes. And if you still hate it, then cool, but, you know. At least then we’ll know for sure.” 

Prompto wants to say no. The thought of just – giving in to all his instincts is – it makes him feel sick to his stomach. The thought of doing that in front of other people – his friends, _Noctis_ – makes him feel like throwing himself off a bridge. But Noct’s looking at him like that, and Prompto doesn’t know how to say no when Noct’s looking like that. It’s like Noct has the maximum possible score in his _convince Prompto to do stuff_ stat, and Prompto’s lucky Noct doesn’t roll it out more often. 

Prompto lets out an explosive sigh. “Fine,” he says. “I’ll try. But just – if I’m being too weird, you gotta tell me, all right?” 

“You got it, buddy,” Noct says, sitting back. His expression is back to normal, and Prompto feels like the light just changed in the room or something. “Anyway, Specs is making dinner, so. Are you coming down?” 

“Hey, did I mention it’s weird that you guys keep breaking into my house and doing, like, housework and cooking and stuff?” Prompto says. 

Noct shrugs. “Like I keep saying, I don’t really care about things being weird.” He glances sideways at Prompto. “But if you don’t want us here, we can go.” 

“No, I-- No,” Prompto says. He gets up and punches Noct in the arm. “I mean, can’t exactly kick the prince out, right? That’s probably treason or something.” 

“Yeah, or something,” Noct says.

~

Later, after they’ve eaten, Gladio offers to do the dishes and Ignis raises his eyebrows at Noct until he offers to dry, since Prompto doesn’t have a dishwasher (and Ignis won’t accept Prompto’s offers to dry even though it’s his house and he really ought to be the one doing the hosting). Prompto and Ignis head to the living room, and Ignis settles in an armchair. Prompto’s about to slump onto the couch, but then he sees the box. He stands and stares at it. Sitting in a box is a cat thing. If he sits in the box, that means he’s doing a cat thing. Like, before it was OK, because he didn’t know, but now if he does it, it’s like – agreeing that it’s OK to do cat stuff. But then – Noct got him the box, and it was really thoughtful of him, and also – Prompto really wants to sit in the box. If he decides he can’t sit in the box, does that mean he can never sit in a box again? Not even the box at Noct’s place? The box at Noct’s place has his name on it. It’d be kind of weird never to sit in it again. Also, he promised Noct he would do cat stuff occasionally. And – he really wants to sit in the box.

Prompto sits in the box. It takes him a couple seconds to figure out what to do with the tail, and eventually he settles for leaving it kind of dangling out of the back of the box, which isn’t ideal, but still. It’s a good box. 

Ignis glances down at him. “I hope it’s the right size,” he says. “Noctis spent a significant amount of time trying to find a product that would come in a box that was the correct size and shape.” 

“Huh. Yeah, it’s perfect,” Prompto says. It is perfect. He really likes sitting in it. He should stop sitting in it now. But – no, he’s supposed to be doing cat stuff. He’s not sure if it counts if he gives up after thirty seconds. Also, he really likes sitting in the box. “Couldn’t he have just, like, asked a box factory to make him one specially?” 

“Yes, well, sometimes he does like to do things the hard way.” Ignis shakes his head a little, but he has that fond look on his face that Prompto secretly thinks of as his _Noct face_. (One of his Noct faces, anyway. The least exasperated-looking one.) “Ah, Prompto, I’ve been meaning to ask as soon as we got a moment alone. I was wondering about your list.” 

Prompto’s heart sinks. He’d kind of hoped Ignis had forgotten all about the list. “Uh, yeah, sure. What about it?” 

“Mm, in particular the entry about not – sniffing me,” Ignis says. “I just – wondered if there was a particular reason you named me specifically?”

“Oh, huh,” Prompto says. “Yeah, I mean, that’s just, you know. Because you smell really good.” 

Ignis sits up a little straighter. “Do I?” 

“Do you what?” Noct asks, wandering into the room with Gladio in tow. He slumps down at the couch, glances at the box – at Prompto in the box – and looks pleased, then looks expectantly at Ignis. 

“I was just saying how Iggy smells good,” Prompto says. “Right?” 

Noct frowns. “He does?” 

“What, you’ve never noticed?” 

“Uh – I mean, it’s not like I go around smelling him,” Noct says. 

Right. Because sniffing people is weird, which is why it was on the list in the first place. But still. “OK, yeah, but you can still smell him. I mean, can’t you smell him from there?” Prompto can smell everyone in the room. Which, to be honest, is kind of unfortunate in Noct’s case. 

Noct stares at him. “Uh, no,” he says. “I don’t have a cat nose, remember?” 

It’s Prompto’s turn to stare. “I mean, me neither,” he says. “But come on, you don’t need a cat nose for that, he’s sitting right there.” 

There’s a silence. Now everyone’s staring at him. Prompto resists the urge to scrunch down in the box and hide. 

“Prompto, it’s possible that you’re underestimating how much better a cat’s sense of smell is compared to a human’s,” Ignis says. 

“I mean, yeah, cats smell better, but my sense of smell is just normal,” Prompto says. “I mean, I’m bad with impulse control when it comes to sniffing people and I guess maybe that’s a cat thing? But it’s not like I can smell anything that you guys can’t.” 

Another silence. 

“You mean, apart from Specs?” Noct says. 

“Hey, so how’d you find the magical objects on the night scavenger hunt, anyway?” Gladio asks, leaning back in the couch and kicking his feet out in front of him. 

“Um, it was pretty easy once I figured out they smelled weird,” Prompto says. “I guess – everyone else took a while to figure that out. I was lucky because I found one real quick at the beginning.” 

“Yeah,” Gladio says. “I did that exercise three years ago, and those things don’t smell of anything as far as I’m concerned.” He looks at Ignis. “Iggy?” 

“My experience was the same,” Ignis says. 

“And I really can’t smell Specs,” Noct puts in. 

Prompto stares at them. They stare back. 

“You’re saying – it’s a cat thing?” Prompto says. “I mean, not just the sniffing, but – being able to smell people at all?”

“It’s not that we can’t smell people, it’s just that they generally have to be quite pungent or only an inch or two from our noses,” Ignis says. 

“Like Gladio after a workout,” Noct adds. 

“Uh-huh. Don’t see Prompto singing the praises of your stench,” Gladio says. 

Noct scowls at him, then turns to Prompto. “I smell good too, though, right?”

Prompto blinks, still trying to deal with the fact that, like – Noct doesn’t know. He really doesn’t know. None of them do. “Um – I mean,” he says. Gladio snorts and Noct starts to look scandalised. “I mean, bud, you probably smell great! It’s just, you know, I can’t really smell you under all the Greatsword body spray and, uh-- It’s – a little much.” 

“Seriously?” Noct says. “But Specs smells good?” 

“A testament to the value of thorough hygiene over shortcuts,” Ignis says. He doesn’t look smug, exactly, because Iggy doesn’t really do smug, but if he _did_ do smug, it would look exactly like the expression he’s making right now. 

“Whatever,” Noct mutters, subsiding into the couch. 

Ignis turns to Prompto, then. “Prompto, if you would enjoy a more detailed olfactory experience, I would have no objection to you indulging yourself from time to time – though perhaps not in the presence of foreign dignitaries and the like.” 

“Huh?” Prompto feels kind of overwhelmed and like he needs a little time to process the whole _cat nose_ thing, and Iggy’s way of talking is really going over his head right now. 

“He says you can sniff him if you want,” Gladio says.

Prompto looks at Gladio. “Huh?” he says again. He can’t – _sniff_ Ignis. He can’t sniff anyone. It’s on his list of things he can’t do. He _especially_ can’t sniff Ignis. He’s spent years training himself not to sniff Ignis. He can’t just do it, like it’s not a big deal. 

“Hey,” Noct says. “Remember what we talked about? About you not fighting it sometimes?” 

Prompto remembers. It was a bad idea. He only agreed to it because it was Noct, and Noct has that superpower thing going for him. He can’t – he can’t sniff Ignis, because if he does, then-- Then--

He blinks. Then what? Everyone in the room already knows he’s weird. They already know he wants to sniff Ignis. Ignis even said he could. And – Ignis smells so good--

And then he’s out of the box, crouching on the arm of Ignis’s chair with his nose up against Ignis’s chest, inhaling deeply. Oh, fuck. He’s known Ignis smelled good since the minute he met him, but he’s never just had the chance to just – enjoy it like this. He inhales again, touching his nose to different parts of Ignis’s chest, and then, without thinking about it, he rubs his head on Ignis. 

Gladio snorts quietly and Prompto snaps back to reality. Shit, he’s _rubbing his head_ on Ignis. He pulls back sharply, almost falling off the arm of the chair. “Sorry – sorry,” he says. 

“No apology needed.” Ignis straightens his shirt a little, but he doesn’t look pissed or anything. In fact, he still looks kind of smug. Or what smug would look like if Iggy did smug. “That was quite enjoyable.” 

Prompto blinks. “Enjoyable?” he says. He glances round at the others. Gladio’s grinning broadly. Noct looks like he’s an orphan boy with his nose pressed against a candy store window. 

“Yes, indeed,” Ignis says. “If you want to do it again at any time, you’d be very welcome.” 

“Yeah,” Noct says, sounding weirdly frantic. “Me, too. I mean, you can do it to me. If you want.” 

“Better ditch that body-spray, princess,” Gladio murmurs. 

“Bite me,” mutters Noct, like he thinks Prompto can’t hear him, which is dumb, because Prompto’s got two sets of ears and also he’s sitting right there. 

“Um – OK.” Prompto’s really not sure what to do with everything that’s happened in the last twenty minutes, so he – gets back in the box. He doesn’t even realise he didn’t have a problem with the tail until he looks down and sees it wrapped neatly around him. Huh. 

And the thing is – the thing is. It turns out that he can smell things better than other people. And that’s – he tries to think of a way that that’s bad, but he can’t. That’s what got him into the Crownsguard, despite all his other failures. That’s what means he can smell Ignis. OK, it means he has to smell Noct, too, so maybe there are some downsides, but-- But. 

“So how’s giving in to your instincts working out for you?” Gladio asks. 

Prompto settles deeper into the box. There’s just – so much going on right now. It’s a lot. 

“Too early to tell,” he says.


	7. Chapter 7

The next day, Prompto’s waiting by the door when Gladio comes to pick him up for training. It’s not exactly that he’s dying to get out there in the gym and have Gladio be a dick to him for two hours, but at the same time, he – kinda wants to see what he might be able to do. Like, he’s only got this body for a month, and he just wants to know what maybe it could have been like, if his balance hadn’t been fucked basically from birth. At least then he’ll know how much of his clumsiness is his fault.

“Ready and waiting, huh?” Gladio says, and thumps him on the back, but doesn’t call him _#teamcatboy_ , which Prompto’s pretty happy about. He’s managed to stay off the internet all morning, and he really wants to just – pretend that there’s no-one out there who knows about all the cat stuff and that he can just work through it without everyone in the world watching him. In the car, he slouches in the seat and does his best not to look at anyone on the street. In the Citadel, he keeps his head down and his hood up. He lives in a city of tens of millions of people, but today he’s determined to pretend it’s just him and his friends. 

And then there they are, in the small gym. And there it is: the balance beam. And behind it, the vaulting horse. Prompto’s seen the Crownsguard, candidates and full members, dance on that thing like they’re weightless. He’s watched them with awe, longing to know what it would be like to be so in control. And he’s always, always avoided going near it, because he knows what would happen if he did: a fall, flat on his face, lucky if he didn’t knock out any teeth. And people laughing, or maybe being nice and trying not to laugh, but feeling sorry for him, because how much must it suck to be so fucking clumsy? 

A lot. It sucks a lot. 

“Hey, Eos to blondie,” Gladio says, waving a hand in front of his face. Prompto blinks and looks at him.

“Balance beam?” he says. He’s not – eager, exactly. He’s kind of nervous. But yesterday he did the balance beam without even thinking about it, and then he got mad and left and he never got the chance to see if he could do that again. Is that what it’s like for those guys? Can they do these things without even thinking about them? 

“I was thinking something a little different,” Gladio says.

Prompto frowns at him. What, he’s finally worked himself up to almost _wanting_ to face the balance beam and now Gladio isn’t even interested any more? That’s just – extremely fucking typical, is what it is. 

Gladio’s staring at him. Or – not him. His face. Prompto’s about to ask him if he’s got, like, ketchup on him or something – which he doesn’t, he would know if he did, Prompto hates being dirty – but before he can, Gladio reaches forward and swipes a hand across his whiskers.

“Ah, _fuck_ ,” Prompto says, stumbling backwards, nerves blaring an alarm. He closes his eyes, pressing his fingertips into his eyeballs and panting as he waits for the overwhelming sensation to subside. “Fuck, Gladio, what? What did you do that for?” 

“Just experimenting,” Gladio says. 

“Huh?” Prompto straightens up and stares at him. “What? I thought you said _being an asshole_ but I couldn’t quite hear through the ringing in my ears.” 

Gladio grins. “OK, sorry,” he says, looking really far from sorry. “Sit down.” 

Prompto glares at him. Gladio waits a moment, then gestures at the mat. “Sit,” he says. “We got a lot of work to do.” 

Prompto has no idea what kind of work they’re going to get done sitting on the floor, but after Gladio raises his eyebrows, he sits. Gladio sits, too, crossing his legs. “Close your eyes,” he says. 

“What, so you can noogie me or something?” 

“You want my help, or not?” 

Prompto wants to say _not_ , but – he does want Gladio’s help. Gladio somehow knows how to help him get the hang of his new parts, and he – he wants to know. He just wants to know what it’s like. So he closes his eyes. 

For a second, nothing happens. Then something brushes against his whiskers and he starts, eyes snapping open, scrambling back across the mat. “Fuck – seriously?” he says. His eyes are watering. Gladio actually does look a little bit sorry this time, but like – but like, Gladio _just_ did that to him and saw how it affected him, and now he does it again? Prompto starts to wonder if he’s done something to offend the big guy because – _seriously_. 

“How’d that feel?” Gladio asks.

“Uh, great,” Prompto says. “Loving the insta-headache.” 

“Uh huh.” Gladio points at the mat where Prompto was sitting before Gladio decided to set off all his nerve endings at once. “Gonna need some more details. You said before it was like someone shouting?” 

Prompto scrubs at his face – carefully avoiding his whiskers – and hunches his shoulders. “Yeah. Kinda.” 

“Kinda?” 

“I don’t know, like – it’s like an alarm. Like my brain’s yelling at me that something important’s happening. It just feels – loud.” 

Gladio nods. He looks thoughtful. “Does your brain say _what’s_ happening, or just that it’s important?” 

Prompto shakes his head. “Uh, fuck, I don’t know. Why are we even talking about this? I thought we were going to train.” 

“I’ve been reading about them,” Gladio says. “I want to see what they can do.”

“Them?” Prompto stares at him. “You mean, like – the whiskers? They don’t do anything. Well, except give me a headache, but that’s not exactly a superpower.” 

“Uh-huh,” Gladio says, like he’s not really listening. “OK. Here’s what we’ll do. Sit like this.” He arranges himself in a meditation posture, legs crossed, shoulders down, hands on his knees. “Loose and relaxed.” 

Prompto sighs and does his best to copy Gladio. He’s never been great at meditation – too easily distracted, as Gladio’s told him more than once – but he takes a couple deep breaths and tries to feel relaxed. His brain is still tingling a little after Gladio’s whisker-swiping.

“OK, breathe and relax,” Gladio says. “Watch me and breathe with me.” 

It’s not the first time they’ve done this – Gladio’s almost as evangelical about calming down as he is about getting worked up, and Prompto’s really not good at it – so Prompto knows the drill. He breathes. He tries not to get distracted. It’s easier than usual because there’s no-one else in the gym, but even so, the moment he tries the _think of nothing_ technique, his brain immediately starts to helpfully fill up his head with bullshit nonsense. He wonders what the inside of Gladio’s head is like right now. Probably like pools still water with hot women meditating calmly on lotus leaves. Prompto’s head is more like a monster truck rally. Shit. He’s definitely not thinking of nothing. He--

“I’m gonna touch your whiskers,” Gladio says. “Keep breathing and stay calm, OK?” 

“Huh?” Prompto says, suddenly feeling anything but calm. Not that he was feeling super calm before, but he was definitely feeling _more_ calm. He debates just – getting up and running away. He really doesn’t want Gladio to touch his whiskers. He hates his whiskers. He thinks he might hate them even more than he hates his tail. At least his tail--

Gladio leans forward and brushes a palm lightly against his whiskers. Prompto starts and pulls back, the whole head-shouting thing kicking in for the third time that morning. Prompto is definitely regretting coming to training. What is Gladio even doing? Is it just _make Prompto miserable_ day today or something? 

“How’s it feel?” Gladio asks. 

“I told you how it feels.” Prompto rubs at his face. “It sucks. But you keep doing it anyway, so, like, what the fuck?” 

“Is it telling you what’s happening, or just that something’s happening?” Gladio asks. 

“Huh?” 

Gladio sighs. Then he sits back in his infuriatingly calm lotus pose. “OK, listen, here’s what I think. Your brain doesn’t know how to interpret the signals that are coming through from the whiskers. It’s not used to them being there, like with how you could feel me touching the tail but you couldn’t really _feel_ it, like it didn’t really feel like part of your body. That’s why it’s so haywire, because it’s trying to figure out what the fuck is happening. So if we train it, it’ll work better.” 

“What’ll work better?” Prompto asks. 

“Your brain,” Gladio says. “OK, so this time I want you to watch what I’m doing. Keep breathing, keep being calm, but be aware of that fact I’m about to touch the whiskers. Think you can manage that?” 

“Uh,” Prompto says. It sounds like a lot. Like, _being calm_ is generally kinda difficult anyway, and then _being calm while being aware that Gladio’s about to do something assholish involving my cat parts that I hate_ is definitely about three steps up from that.

“That’s the spirit,” Gladio says. “OK, calm. Breathe. Pay attention.” 

Prompto breathes. He pays attention. Gladio starts reaching out towards him. Prompto starts breathing faster. He’s definitely still breathing, though, so – that counts, right? He’s pretty sure that still counts. Then Gladio brushes his hand against Prompto’s whiskers and Prompto’s head goes _HEY! Heyheyheyheyhey_ , and Prompto grits his teeth and tries not to just run away. 

“Are you breathing?” Gladio asks.

And Prompto’s – not. Huh. He lets out his breath. “Yeah,” he says, sounding pretty unconvincing. “Gladio, come on. This isn’t working, so let’s just – not do it.” He doesn’t want Gladio to touch his whiskers. He doesn’t want anyone to touch him at all. He’s starting to think he should have just gone with his first instincts three days ago and hidden under his bed forever. 

“So you just want to have your brain yell at you every time they brush against something for the rest of your life?” 

“I mean, looks like that’s what’s going to happen anyway, so,” Prompto says. “Anyway, it’s just for another month. So I can just – make sure nothing touches them.” 

“How’re you gonna do that, smart guy?” Gladio asks. 

Prompto decides that _hide under the bed and come out when the month’s up_ probably isn’t going to pass muster as an answer, so he just shrugs. Gladio rolls his eyes. 

“OK, well, you wanted to train, so we’re doing this,” he says. “So stop panicking and breathe with me.” 

“I’m not – _panicking_ ,” Prompto says, but Gladio just breathes, and after a moment Prompto gives up and breathes too. In – out. In – out. 

“OK, pay attention to what I’m doing,” Gladio says. “I’m going to touch your whiskers. Make sure you keep breathing.”

Prompto focuses on breathing. Then he focuses on Gladio’s hand, reaching out towards his face. Then he focuses on breathing. Then he tries to focus on both at once. Wow. This shit is hard.

Gladio’s hand makes contact. Prompto’s head goes _HE-_ and Prompto thinks _breathe breathe breathe_ and then--

Prompto’s head is shouting. Kinda. But instead of just shouting _HEY_ , it’s shouting _hey dude something is on your left side! On your left! Are you listening?!?_

Huh.

Gladio’s still leaning forward, hand in mid-air, though he’s not touching the whiskers any more. He’s watching Prompto. “Something different happened, huh?” 

“Uh.” Prompto scrubs his forehead with the knuckles of one hand. All this is definitely not helping his headache. “Yeah, it was – I don’t know. More informative? Like, it told me where you were. I mean, not super useful, because I can see where you are with my eyes, but – yeah, different.” 

Gladio nods. “Then let’s do it again,” he says.

~ 

They do it again. And again. And after a while Prompto’s head gets – quieter. It still gives him the heads-up every time Gladio touches his whiskers, but now it’s less of a screaming panic attack and more of a set of information about exactly which whiskers were touched and with what level of force. Eventually, these estimations of how far Gladio’s hand is from his face start popping into his head. It’s – weird. But definitely better than being yelled at incoherently. 

“It’s working, huh?” Gladio says, when he’s just brushed against Prompto’s whiskers and Prompto’s failed to flinch for the third time in a row. “It’s better?” 

“Yeah.” He has no idea how Gladio seems to know what to do to make his cat parts work better, but – yeah, it’s a definite improvement. “Thanks, big guy.” 

Gladio nods. He doesn’t look smug, which is kinda weird. Instead, he looks thoughtful.

“OK, close your eyes,” he says. 

“Uh—” Prompto says, on the verge of refusing after what happened last time, but – but OK, Gladio was a dick last time, but he was trying to help – kinda – and now he has actually helped, and maybe Prompto should give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe. Fuck it. He closes his eyes. 

“OK, tell me where my hand is,” Gladio says. 

For a couple of seconds, there’s nothing, but then Prompto feels Gladio’s hand brush against the whiskers on his left side. It’s a light touch – way lighter than anything Gladio was doing before – but the things are pretty sensitive. 

“Left side,” he says, and opens his eyes. 

Gladio’s staring at him like he can’t decide whether to be shocked or delighted. “Huh,” he says.

“What?” Prompto says. He knows it was the left side, so what’s Gladio so surprised about? “I mean, I can still feel stuff with my eyes closed.” 

“I didn’t touch them,” Gladio says. 

“Huh?” Prompto doesn’t get it. “Yeah, you did. I felt you.” 

But Gladio shakes his head, then reaches out and waves his hand near Prompto’s face. Near, but not near enough to touch the whiskers. And – Prompto’s aware of it. It’s not just that he can see it, but he can _feel_ it, feel Gladio’s hand moving, like it’s touching the whiskers, only it’s not. 

Prompto stares at Gladio. “How the fuck--?” 

And now Gladio does look smug, which at least makes Prompto feel a little less disoriented. “They’re perfectly balanced,” he says. “You can feel the air moving. Makes it easier to hunt if you can get a full picture of everything that’s going on around you.” 

“Huh?” Prompto says again. “I don’t – need to hunt.” He feels like – he has no idea what’s going on. 

“So what was that you were saying about them not giving you superpowers?” Gladio says. “Gonna come in pretty handy if you ever need to do stealth work." 

Prompto stares at him. Why would he ever need to do stealth work? Prompto is, like, the least stealthy person ever. And also, that sounds like something a superspy ninja would do. Prompto maybe has some illusions that one day he could be an OK photographer and possibly not completely fail at being a Crownsguard, but superspy ninja? Har-de-har-har. 

Gladio gets to his feet. “OK, enough sitting. Let’s get the blood flowing. You wanna try the balance beam?” 

And Prompto’s really not done being confused about the whole thing where his whiskers can feel stuff that isn’t even touching them, but – yeah. Yeah, actually, he kinda does. 

~

The balance beam and Prompto have been enemies since Prompto first learned what a balance beam was, back in elementary school. Sometimes, he imagines it’s always been waiting for him, ever since the first evil genius decided to invent a device for testing balance, lurking in the shadows, waiting for its perfect victim: Prompto Argentum, the ultimate prey. Other people have nightmares about taking exams or showing up to school naked, Prompto has nightmares about the balance beam. (And also about taking exams and showing up to school naked. And sometimes about giant mushrooms chasing him through the Citadel. Prompto’s subconscious is unpleasantly creative that way.) And now--

And now. Prompto crosses the balance beam like it’s nothing, steps down from it, and turns to stare at it. It looks the same: same uncompromisingly narrow, slightly splintery surface. Same evil stare. (Noct says Prompto is imagining the evil stare, but Prompto knows an evil stare when he sees one.) And yet, here Prompto is. Not on the floor. It’s like everything he knew has just been tossed out the window. 

Gladio comes up to him and smacks him on the back so hard Prompto nearly falls over. “Good fucking job,” he says, beaming. “So I guess it’s time to graduate.” 

“Graduate?” Prompto says, trying to rub his shoulder in an unobtrusive way, because if Gladio realises how much that hurt he’ll probably just do it again. 

Gladio’s smile widens, and he points. Prompto follows the line of his finger.

The pommel horse. 

Prompto swallows. “You think I can?” he breathes. 

“I know you can,” Gladio says. “Just try vaulting it to start off with. You’ll probably fuck it up the first couple of times, but you’ll get it. So – go get it.” 

Prompto stares at the pommel horse. He doesn’t even really know what you’re supposed to do with it. Gladio says _just try vaulting it_ like Prompto has any idea how to do that. Like, how you’re supposed to start. Just – run at it and jump over it, he guesses? Maybe? He glances at Gladio, and Gladio raises his eyebrows and jerks his head at the horse, like it’s something everyone knows how to do from birth. Which, Gladio probably did know how to do it from birth. Gladio probably vaulted out of his crib before he could walk. Gladio--

“You know it’s not gonna come to you, right?” Gladio says.

Prompto takes a deep breath and runs at the pommel horse. 

And – stops. He gets to the point where he really needs to be gearing up to jump, and his brain goes _wtf you are not capable of doing this_ and he – stops. Well, _falls_ , might be a more appropriate description, but the pommel horse stops him from anything more than an embarrassing stumble, so he’s just going to call it a slightly ungainly halt. 

“What happened?” Gladio calls. 

“Um.” Prompto tries to think of something that might have happened. “My – shoe’s untied.” A moment later he realises that would be more convincing if he was wearing shoes, but no cover story’s perfect. 

Gladio stomps over to him and folds his arms, frowning down at him. “You gotta jump,” he says. “You need the momentum or you’ll never make it.” 

“Yeah, I – yeah.” Prompto scratches the back of his head. “I mean – maybe I’m just not – maybe it’s not such a great idea.” 

“Bull. Shit.” Gladio grabs his arm and drags him back towards the starting point. “You run, you jump, you grab the handles. Don’t think about it. Just do it.” 

“Uh, thanks for the pep talk,” Prompto says, rubbing his arm when Gladio lets go of it. “You’re – a little intense today.” 

“Got a job to do,” Gladio says. He points at the horse. “Run. Jump. Don’t think. Got it?” 

Prompto nods. Run. Jump. Don’t think. Fuck, but he’s already thinking. He’s thinking about breaking his teeth landing face-first on the horse. He’s thinking about how much it’ll cost to get his teeth fixed. He’s thinking about--

“Go!” Gladio says, and shoves him hard. He stumbles forward, then starts running, since it seems like he might as well at this point. He sees the horse coming closer. He eyes the handles, trying to gauge the distance. When should he jump? Now? No, it’s too soon. Maybe he should--

“Prompto, your shoe’s untied!” Gladio yells, and Prompto glances back over his shoulder and frowns, because he’s not wearing--

\--huh.

“Fuck me,” Gladio says. 

Prompto doesn’t say anything. He just stares. Because – he thinks you’re supposed to vault over the horse, or at least, that’s what he originally planned, but he’s – sitting on the horse. Not sitting. Crouched. And not on the main part of the horse, but on one of the handles. He’s – never seen someone do that before. He has no idea how he did it. He has no idea how he hasn’t fallen off yet. Oh _shit_ \--

“Whoa,” Gladio says, catching him before he can topple. “Fuck. That was fucking cool.” 

Prompto carefully climbs off the handle and back onto the floor. He feels – wild. He’s not sure he’s ever felt quite like this before.

“Yeah,” he says. “It was.” 

~

After that, Gladio calls a halt on cat-training and they just go for a run. Well, they don’t actually _go_ anywhere – Prompto doesn’t really want to go running in a giant hoodie, not to mention his balance is shot when the tail’s stuffed in his pants, so they can’t go outside. But they do a few laps of the gym, and Prompto feels better than he has in a while. Then Gladio drives him back to his house. At least, that’s what Prompto thinks is happening, until Gladio pulls up outside Noct’s apartment building and looks at him expectantly.

“Uh,” Prompto says. “This isn’t my house.” He’s pretty sure Gladio already knows that, but it’s always good to check these things.

“Iggy wants you upstairs,” Gladio says. “I gotta go get a couple things, I’ll join you guys soon.”

“Oh, OK.” Prompto’s not sure why Ignis couldn’t just text him whatever he wants to ask, but actually, now he’s here, he’s kinda happy about it. He hasn’t been to Noct’s apartment in over two weeks, what with prepping for the Crownsguard ceremony and then turning into a cat, and he feels – weirdly homesick? Huh. Prompto already came to terms with the fact that his life revolves around Noct in a way that probably isn’t that healthy, but he definitely didn’t know he was also in an unhealthy relationship with Noct’s apartment. On the other hand, it does have a really amazing view.

When he knocks on the door, Ignis calls for him to come in. Noct’s not in evidence, but Ignis is standing by the table, looking at some map or something he’s got spread out. And he smells weirdly like he’s wearing way more deodorant that usual. Huh.

“Ah, Prompto, excellent,” Iggy says, coming over to him and looking him up and down. “How much do you weigh?”

“That’s, uh – a little personal,” Prompto says. 

“Well, I have it somewhere from the Crownsguard tests anyway,” Ignis says, holding his hand flat beside the top of Prompto’s head for a moment, then going back to the table. He seems kinda distracted, staring at the corner of the room for some reason and then looking back at Prompto. “Could you--” He takes Prompto by the shoulders and moves him into the corner he seems to like, then looks from the ceiling to the floor. “Hm.” 

“Uh, Iggy? You OK?”

“Hm? Oh, yes, I do apologise. I was just thinking about a shelf.” 

“A – shelf?” Prompto is getting a little worried now. It’s not like Iggy to be incoherent like this. And then there’s the weird deodorant thing. Something’s definitely off. 

“Exactly.” Ignis gestures at the corner like that explains everything. “Of course, I can’t see a way that we could permit you to sit on the counter, but I’ve been doing a little reading and I have a better understanding of what led you to that behaviour now. You see, if it was about this high” – he holds his hand at about his eye height – “and positioned here, you’d have plenty of head space but there would still be an excellent view.”

Prompto frowns, trying to untangle what Ignis is saying. A – shelf? He’d have an excellent view? He glances at the map on the table and sees that it’s not a map. It’s a diagram. It’s a diagram of a – shelf. A shelf with a stick figure sitting on it. The stick figure has cat ears and a tail. 

He looks back at the corner, then at the diagram. There’s a couch in the diagram with another stick figure lying on it, and if he lines the couch up with the one in the room, then the corner with the shelf in it lines up with the corner Iggy’s weirdly interested in. If there was a shelf there – it would have an excellent view. He looks back at Iggy. “You – want to build a cat shelf?” 

“Well, I wouldn’t build it myself,” Ignis says. “The Citadel has a maintenance team for such things.”

Prompto stares at him. Then he looks at the diagram again. “Um, but isn’t – don’t you need to check with Noct?” It’s Noct’s apartment, after all. Or maybe the King’s apartment. Prompto’s really not sure the King’s gonna be happy with structural alterations to his apartment so Prompto can get a better view. 

“Noct’s OK with it,” Noct mumbles from the couch, where apparently he’s been sleeping this whole time. “Specs says we can get an extension for the game controllers.” 

Prompto stares at the back of the couch, Noct invisible behind it. Then he looks at the corner. He looks at the diagram. Who drew it? Ignis? Ignis and Noct have already been talking about this. About making a shelf so Prompto can sit somewhere up high. He swallows. He blinks. He tries really hard not to cry, but he can’t – quite--

“What? Hey.” Prompto looks up to see that Noct’s off the couch and standing in front of him, grabbing his shoulders, face worried. “Hey. Don’t cry. Hey.” Then Noct hugs him, and Prompto definitely does cry a little, but come on, Iggy wants to build him a Prompto shelf. He can’t believe – he can’t believe his friends. He can’t believe he has such amazing friends. 

“You guys are the best,” he mumbles into Noct’s chest, and Noct rubs his back and then quickly stops and pats it instead. 

“You’re OK, though, right?” Noct says, stepping back. “You’re not upset?” 

Prompto shakes his head, and then frowns. Noct’s wearing Iggy’s deodorant. He’s wearing a _lot_ of Iggy’s deodorant. That – explains some things, actually. 

“Did you – steal Iggy’s products?” he asks. 

Noct suddenly looks hopeful. “Yeah. You didn’t like the Greatsword, so I thought--” He bounces a little on his feet, looking at Prompto like he’s expecting something.

“Uh – but did you, like, bathe in it or something?” It’s not that Prompto doesn’t like Iggy’s deodorant – well, actually, it is that he doesn’t like it. To be more specific, it’s fine, but deodorant just smells like weird artificial shit, so the less the better, as far as Prompto’s concerned. It’s a big improvement on what Noct was using before, but it’s still – a lot. 

“Well, I mean – you said you liked it, so--” 

“I didn’t – um, it’s not the deodorant,” Prompto says. “I mean – maybe just – not so much, next time? But thanks, bud, that was real nice of you.” He punches Noct in the arm, and Noct’s shoulders slump. 

“Yeah, fine,” he mutters. 

“About the shelf,” Ignis starts, but then the door opens and Gladio comes through, Iris in tow. 

“Cavalry’s here,” Gladio says, for no apparent reason. 

“Prompto!” Iris cries. She comes hurrying up to him. “Oh, wow, you look amazing!” 

“Um – huh?” Prompto says. Iris usually reserves the _you look amazing_ comments for Noct, and right now Prompto’s fresh from the gym and hasn’t slept well in days, so he knows he looks pretty terrible. 

“Wow,” Iris says again, staring at him, eyes round. Staring at his ears. Oh. Right, Prompto gets it now. Iris is here, and she’s a normal person so she’s gonna stare at him like he’s a freak – because he is a freak – and he – and he--

“I guess maybe I’m gonna go home,” he says, but Gladio reaches out a hand and stops him. 

“Nope, I’ve got plans for you,” he says. “Iris, stop staring. Did you bring the stuff?” 

“Uh huh.” Iris digs into her bag and produces – a set of cat ears. She puts them on and beams at him. 

Prompto makes some kind of effort to smile back, but he’s – really uncomfortable right now. What, did Gladio bring Iris here just to make him feel like shit? Gladio can be a dick, but that’s really – that’s really assholish, wow.

Iris is rummaging in her bag some more, and she produces a second set of cat ears. “Gladdy,” she says, and Gladio bends down for her to put them on his head. Prompto frowns. What the fuck? Gladio is wearing cat ears. _Gladio_ is wearing _cat ears_. 

“You get the t-shirts?” Gladio asks. 

Iris unzips her jacket. Underneath, she’s wearing a pink t-shirt with _Purrrompto!_ emblazoned on it. She pulls another t-shirt out of her bag and hands it to Gladio. He pulls off his shirt and pulls the new one over his head. It’s pink, too, and has a _#teamcatboy_ logo. It’s also, like, two sizes too small for Gladio. Not that he seems to mind. 

Then Iris turns to him. She’s holding out another shirt. Prompto feels – he feels sick. He wants to cry again, but not out of gratitude this time. “I--” he says.

“Oh, let me do it,” Iris says, and then she’s holding – a headband. But it’s just a headband, bright pink, but no cat ears. She reaches up and pushes it onto his head, just in front of his ears. “You think?” she says to Gladio.

“Yeah, I think it’s gonna work,” Gladio says. 

Prompto stares at him. He stares at Iris. He feels awful. But he also feels – really confused? “Can someone tell me what the – um, eff is going on?” 

Gladio grins. Iris clasps her hands and flutters her eyelashes. 

“Oh em gee!” she squeals. “Those ears are sooooooo realistic! Where did you get them? Were they expensive? You look amazing!” 

Prompto blinks in confusion. Iris and Gladio are both beaming at him, but he can’t understand – he can’t – 

\--oh, wait. Wait. Prompto looks at Iris wearing cat ears, at Gladio wearing cat ears, then puts his hand up and touches the headband on his own head. “You think – people are gonna think they’re fake?” he says. 

“I mean, they’re obviously fake,” Iris says. “I can see the headband. But they’re sooooo good, though! And you have whiskers, too, wow! I’m definitely getting some whiskers next time!” 

Prompto – doesn’t know what to say. Gladio claps him on the shoulder. 

“Welcome to Team Catboy,” he says. “Trying out some camouflage.” 

“I—” Prompto looks around. It looks like Noct and Iggy already knew what was up, although they’re not looking as hyper excited as Iris – in fact, Noct looks a little worried. “I don’t know if that’ll work…”

“Only one way to find out.” Gladio opens the door and gestures. “Time you got some fresh air.” 

Iris smiles and holds out the shirt again. Prompto shakes his head, raising his hands. 

“No, I can’t – I can’t,” he says. He can’t wear a shirt like that. He can’t – he can’t go outside. Can he go outside? He doesn’t think he can go outside. 

Iris’ smile fades slightly, but then she shrugs and shoves the shirt back in her bag. She gives Prompto an appraising look, then reaches up and adjusts the headband. Her fingers brush against his ears. “Oh, wow,” she says. “That’s so soft.” 

( _What? How is that fair?_ whispers Noct to Ignis, and Ignis hushes him.)

Prompto swallows. There’s a lot of things happening pretty fast and he’s not sure – he’s not sure. He thinks he might be scared. He’s scared of going outside. Fuck. But he – but suddenly, he really wants to. A few days ago, he wouldn’t have thought twice about just strolling on out the door, and now – and now everything sucks. He glances at the window. It’s a beautiful autumn day, a little hazy. He imagines what it’s like out there, the fresh breeze, the smell of damp and woodsmoke. The thought of it makes him ache. Can he really just not go outside for a whole month? He thinks he might go crazy. 

Or maybe. “Um, are you guys coming?” he asks, looking at Noct and Iggy. 

“I’m not the best guy to have with you if you’re going for inconspicuous,” Noct says.

“You’d look so cute in cat ears, though!” Iris says, and Noct smiles a little. 

“I’m afraid I am otherwise engaged,” Ignis says. “But I’m sure Gladio and Iris will be good company.” 

It’s not the company Prompto’s worried about. Or, no, it is, but it’s not about Gladio and Iris. It’s about whoever else might be out there, waiting to stare at him. He can’t just – go outside, like it’s nothing. Like there’s nothing wrong with him. Or maybe. 

There’s a silence that’s long enough to be awkward. Then Iris touches his arm. 

“You don’t have to, if you don’t want,” she says. 

“Yeah, I--” Prompto says. He’ll just go home. It was really nice of Iris and Gladio, but he really doesn’t think it’ll work. 

Or maybe – it could?

“I – yeah,” he says. He looks at the window, at the blue, hazy sky. “Yeah. OK.” 

Iris beams. Gladio grins. 

“OK, then,” he says. “Let’s go.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo hoo, happy new year, everyone! The latest piece of art from Thwippersnapple is [gorgeous](https://twitter.com/Thwippersnappl1/status/1342219060784680960), as always, and I highly recommend you go take a look and give the artist some love ♥ They capture so many of the moments from this fic so beautifully. 
> 
> And now, on with the show!

Prompto almost manages to get outside without any issues. Almost. But the issue this time around, as it turns out, isn’t other people, but Prompto himself. Namely, the fact that he makes it to the entrance to Noct’s fancy building and then just – kinda stops. 

Gladio and Iris sail on out of the building and only notice he’s not with them when they’re a few steps down the street. Gladio turns and frowns. Iris comes hurrying back. 

“Prompto, come on,” she says, tugging at his arm. “It’s nice out!” 

Prompto swallows. “Um,” he says, because he is super smart and articulate. And also because he’s – freaking out. He thinks he’s doing a pretty good job of not _outwardly_ freaking out, but on the other hand, he’s standing frozen in front of Noct’s fancy doorman and Noct’s fancy bodyguard’s fancy sister like a zombie, so maybe – not?

The thing is, Prompto’s never been outside with the ears just – on display. Really, the only time he’s been outside for any length of time at all since The Cattening was his trip to the park, and that didn’t end well. It didn’t end well even though he was hiding everything he could manage to hide. So to just – mosey on out there with everything just – hanging out is--

Well. Prompto’s freaking out, is what it is. 

Gladio strides over and glares down at him. “What?” he says.

“Uh,” Prompto says. “Just – what if…?” 

“Yeah?” Gladio says. “What if?” 

Prompto thinks about _what if_. What if someone realises his ears aren’t fake? They might – stare at him. Take pictures and upload them to the internet. No-one’s gonna try anything physical with Gladio and Iris on his side, but – but even thinking about the things they could do that wouldn’t involve even coming near him makes him feel – sick. 

“I don’t think I can,” he whispers. 

Gladio shrugs. “Well, I know you can, so. We gonna have to throw down?” 

“I – what?” Prompto stares at him. He thinks Gladio’s joking, but on the other hand, he can’t completely rule out the possibility that Gladio would beat him up because he’s too scared to go outside. 

“Gladdy, don’t be mean,” Iris says, punching Gladio’s arm. Then she turns to Prompto. “Prompto, come on, I know you can do it!” And without warning, she grabs his arm and hauls on it, hard. Prompto’s taken off guard and stumbles forward, and Iris presses her advantage and keeps pulling, and before Prompto’s had a chance to really register what’s happening, he’s – outside.

Iris beams at him. “There! I knew you could do it.” 

Gladio ruffles her hair and then throws an arm round Prompto’s shoulders, in what maybe ought to be a friendly gesture but feels more like a way of not-very subtly shoving him along the sidewalk. “All right,” he says. “Let’s get this show on the road.” 

And Prompto – gets this show on the road. Not that he has a lot of choice, but now that he’s outside and so far nothing bad has happened, he feels – OK, still kinda freaked out, but better than he did when he was standing in the foyer of Noct’s building. He’s not sure exactly what he expected to happen the moment he stepped out the door – like, maybe the clouds would part and a giant hand would come down and point at him while a giant voice said _this person is a freak_ – but whatever it was, it hasn’t happened. And there aren’t any clouds to part, anyway – it really is a gorgeous day, the sky high and blue and cold, the sun making that fall angle that makes the light look weirdly rich even though it’s moving towards winter-pale. Some of the trees still have leaves on them, yellow and red and orange, and other leaves are skittering along the street in the dry wind. Prompto determinedly doesn’t look at the skittery ones, but then there’s not a lot of choice but to look at the people they’re passing, and he’s kind of scared to do that in case--

\--huh.

So here’s the thing: Prompto’s a – catperson. And that would normally be kind of conspicuous. But Gladio is a giant man wearing cat ears, with his muscles bulging out of a tight pink t-shirt, and, uh, yeah. It turns out that some things are more conspicuous than an incognito catperson. Most people they pass just ignore them, because it’s Insomnia and that’s what people do in the Crown City, but the ones that do look completely ignore Prompto in favour of casting sidelong glances (or in a few cases, openly staring) at Gladio. Gladio grins and flexes his muscles, and it’s like Prompto doesn’t exist at all.

Huh. Camouflage. 

“Hey, let’s get some food!” Iris says, skipping a little ahead of them and then turning round to walk backwards so she can face them. “I’m starving.” 

“I’m not sure--” Prompto says, because getting food is going to mean interacting with someone, and interacting with someone means they’ll get a chance to get a closer look at him, and--

“Sure,” Gladio says. “Gotta go somewhere they do lots of meat for our obligate carnivore buddy, though.” 

“Our – what?” Prompto asks. 

“That means you need to eat a lot of meat,” Iris says. “Iggy sent a list. Fish is OK, too.” 

“Iggy sent – a list?” Not that that’s really that surprising – Iggy _loves_ lists – but--

“Perfect,” Gladio says, and wheels them around and in through the door of a Crow’s Nest while Prompto is still trying to deal with the last three things that have happened. “Iris, you order.” He drags Prompto over to a table, shoves him into the chair nearest the window, then sits down next to him so that Prompto can barely see the room past his giant chest. 

“Um,” Prompto says. His voice cracks a little. He’s in – a Crow’s Nest. A fucking _Crow’s Nest_ , and his ears are _right there_ , and he’s seen them moving in the mirror, he knows they move by themselves, he doesn’t know how to stop them doing it. What if someone sees them moving and realises--

“Hey,” Gladio says. He puts his arm round him again, only this time he doesn’t try to shove him or drag him or move him at all. Just – kinda puts his arm round him. “It’s cool. No-one’s looking at you. Why would anyone look at you when they could look at me?”

“Ass,” Prompto says. It comes out sounding kind of strangled, but Gladio grins, and it’s – almost normal. 

“I got you buuuuuurgers!” Iris sings, arriving at the table with a laden tray. “The girl at the counter thinks your ears are super cute, by the way.” 

“Huh?” 

“She says she likes guys who are secure enough in their masculinity to wear cat ears in public,” Iris says, opening the burger boxes one by one and removing the bun from each before stacking the patties on top of each other. 

“Uh, you sure she wasn’t talking about me?” Gladio says. 

“Nope.” Iris beams and pushes the stack of meat in Prompto’s direction. “Doesn’t like muscleheads, secure or insecure.” 

“Hey!” Gladio reaches over and tries to steal Iris’s fries, and she tussles with him across the table. Meanwhile, Prompto – thinks about leaning past Gladio to see the girl at the counter. Thinks about how she might look at him, and then maybe the ears would move and then she--

“Eat your burgers,” Gladio says. 

Prompto picks up the stack of burgers and takes a huge bite.

He doesn’t lean past Gladio.

~

And then – nothing happens. They eat their food. No-one comes over and accuses Prompto of being an abomination, or tries to proposition him, or even really looks at him at all. Not that anyone can really see him past Gladio, but still. No-one tries to proposition Gladio, either, and Gladio doesn’t try to proposition anyone, and so all in all it’s pretty uneventful for a trip out with Gladio. After the food, Gladio buys them all ice-cream and they sit on a wall by the river and watch people go by. And it’s the same: if anyone looks at them, they mostly look at Gladio. But a few people do glance at him, too. But – they just glance. Like a catperson is something you see all the time in Insomnia. Or – like a guy wearing fake cat ears is something you see all the time in Insomnia. Which – yeah. As it turns out, it is. Because the only people who pay them more than a couple seconds’ attention are other people wearing cat ears. They’re mostly girls in their teens, with a few boys mixed in, and whenever one of them spots Prompto’s group sitting on the wall, they grin and wave, like wearing cat ears is some kind of secret handshake or something. A really not-secret secret handshake. Gladio and Iris grin and wave back. Prompto – tries really hard not to run away. Occasionally he starts to get off the wall, and then Gladio puts an arm round him and squeezes a little, and Prompto sits back down. And it’s – it’s kind of awful. But it’s kind of OK, too? Like, sitting out here in the fresh air eating ice-cream with his friends and people-watching is – something he used to completely take for granted, and only now does he realise how much he enjoys it. Even if his stomach tries to crawl out of his body every time someone looks his way.

“Everybody thinks you’re so cute, Prompto!” Iris says, crunching on her ice-cream cone and waving at a passing group of cat-eared high-school kids. 

“Huh?” Prompto frowns at her. “No-one’s even looking at me.” Thank fuck. 

“Yeah, because they don’t know it’s you,” Iris says. “But they’re all wearing ears because they wish they were as cute as you!” 

Prompto stares. He hadn’t even – really thought about why people were wearing the ears. To torture him, maybe. To show him up for the freak he is. But like, that – doesn’t actually make sense when he thinks about it. That would be a weird thing for a bunch of strangers to do. Not that wearing cat ears isn’t kind of a weird thing anyway, but – but--

“Wow, your t-shirt is great! I haven’t seen one like that before,” says someone, and Prompto looks up to see that one of the high-school girls has come over to talk to Iris. His whole insides feel like they’ve turned to ice, and he shuffles quickly back so that he’s invisible behind Gladio.

“Thanks!” Iris says. “I had it made specially!” 

“Ohhhh, cool,” the girl says. “I’m gonna see if I can get one made, too.” 

“Your ears are really lifelike,” Iris says. Prompto cringes. 

“Oh, they’re great, aren’t they?” the girl says. “They were pretty expensive. Apparently they’re making battery-powered moving ones now, though, I really want some.” 

“Seems like a good way to set your hair on fire,” Gladio puts in.

“No way, they’d be amazing!” the girl says. “Man, I wish I had real cat ears. All the girls in my class would be soooo jealous!” 

“They’d think you were super cool!” Iris says. “And you’d probably be able to hear a lot of stuff, too.” 

“Yeah, I bet Prompto can hear tons!” the girl says. “I hope he feels better soon, we all feel so bad for him. I can’t wait to see a better picture of him in the Crownsguard uniform. He’s gonna win this year’s _Miss Teen Insomnia Hottest Crownsguard_ competition for sure!” 

“Hey!” Gladio says. “There are other hot Crownsguard, you know.” 

“Oh, yeah, but none of them are as awesome as Prompto,” the girl says. Then someone shouts from across the street, and she calls back. “Anyway, gotta go! Great ears!” 

The girl runs off. Gladio snickers. Iris jumps off the wall and comes round to sit by Prompto. 

“That’s hilarious,” she says. “She had no idea that you were right here.” 

Prompto swallows. He feels – weird. Like, he kind of feels terrible, but at the same time – nothing really bad happened, he guesses? And the girl – she wasn’t a bad person. She didn’t say anything bad about Prompto. She didn’t say anything _good_ about him, either, just about his cat parts, which isn’t really something he can take credit for, but. She didn’t say he was a freak. She even said she hoped he felt better soon. She doesn’t even know him.

“OK, Miss Teen Insomnia Hottest Crownsguard,” Gladio says. “Let’s get moving before I freeze my ass off.”

“You could put on a jacket,” Iris says. 

“What, and deprive Insomnia of these biceps?” Gladio flexes and then slings an arm round Prompto’s shoulders. 

And just like that, it’s like nothing even happened. 

~

But then something does happen. They’re meandering in the general direction of Prompto’s house when they stop to cross a street. While they’re waiting for the light to turn, Prompto becomes aware that someone’s watching him. Someone very – short. He looks down and sees a kid, maybe five or six, gaping up at him. He looks quickly away. Aside from teenage catplayers, little kids have been the only people who’ve paid much attention to the three of them, and even they’ve mostly been taken by Gladio. But this kid is looking very specifically at him.

“Mommy,” the kid says, tugging on his mom’s hand. “That man is a cat.” 

The mom glances down, then up at him, smiles in a fondly embarrassed way, and ruffles the kid’s hair. 

“He’s just pretending, kiddo. Remember we talked about all the people pretending because they think the Crownsguard Catboy is so cool?” 

Prompto winces at _Crownsguard Catboy_ , but the kid’s still staring at him. 

“But mommy, he _really is_ a cat,” the kid says. 

“Hush,” the mom says, then looks at Prompto. Looks at his ears. And apparently – doesn’t notice anything weird about them. “Sorry,” she says. “He’s really excited by all the catboy stuff.” 

“No, it’s – fine,” Prompto croaks. Then the light turns and the mom crosses the street, half-dragging the kid, who keeps glancing back at him. Gladio and Iris cross, too, then turn back halfway when they realise Prompto’s still standing on the sidewalk. When they get back to his side, Gladio opens his mouth, then looks at Prompto’s face and frowns.

“Problem?” 

Prompto opens his mouth, closes it, then swallows. 

“Can we go home?” he says. He suddenly just feels – really tired. “I really want to go home.” 

He expects Gladio to start shoving him in the exact opposite direction of home, or at least make some crack about his manhood. But Gladio just looks at him and nods. 

“Sure,” he says. “We’ll take you home.” 

~

When they get to his house, Prompto stands awkwardly on the doorstep. He doesn’t really want to invite Gladio and Iris in, but at the same time he feels like it would be rude not to. Luckily, Iris announces that she needs to go anyway, and Gladio says he’ll walk her to wherever it is she’s going.

“So anyway, um, thanks,” Prompto says. “That was – thank you.” He takes the headband off and holds it out to Iris, but she waves her hand. 

“Keep it,” she says. “I’ve got more.” Then she smiles at him. “You really do look amazing.” 

And then they leave. Prompto goes inside, closes the door, and leans against it, eyes closed. He feels – he doesn’t even know how he feels. Except he feels really tired. And like he maybe doesn’t want to talk to anyone for the next week. 

He goes upstairs and is about to crawl into bed but find himself crawling under it instead. He promised himself he wouldn’t do this – he’s pretty sure normal people don’t hide under their beds once they’re past the age of ten or so – but it’s so – safe and dark and comforting. He’ll just stay here for a couple minutes. Then he’ll get up and be a normal person again. 

He falls asleep. 

~

When he wakes up, it’s morning and his eyelids are stuck together with sleep goo. Also, he’s lying under his bed. Huh. He definitely did not intend to sleep under his bed. In fact, he definitely did not intend to fall asleep at, like, 5 pm and sleep through till morning. He lies on his back, looking up at the underside of his bed – wow, he really should dust under here – and thinks about the day before. Then he decides to stop thinking about it, because he doesn’t know how to feel about it and somehow that’s even more panic-inducing than just feeling like it was terrible. Instead, he crawls out from under the bed and checks his phone. 

32 unread messages. 

Prompto stares at the total, then flips to his messenger app, hoping it’s just the guys doing a back-and-forth in the group chat. But most of the messages are just private ones to him. Mostly from Noct, some from Ignis and Gladio. A few in the group chat. One from Iris. Shit. Did something happen? Did – shit, maybe something happened to his parents?

He opens his conversation with Noct, scrolls quickly down and sees – nothing. Well, not nothing, but nothing that says _btw, your parents were killed in a freak accident_ , so that’ s good enough. He takes a second to heave in a few deep breaths, then goes back to read the messages.

_Gladio said your date went well_

_It went well, right?_

_Want to play King’s Knight?_

_Prompto?_

_Gladio says you were maybe a little freaked out at the end so_

_You OK?_

_Prompto?_

_Prompto?_

_Anyway, you missed absolutely nothing here_

_Specs is obsessed with the shelf thing_

_Think I can persuade him that I should be eating the same diet as you as a controlled experiment?_

_Prompto?_

_Are you OK?_

And on it goes. Prompto chews his lip and checks the other messages. Gladio’s are casual with an undercurrent of _hey, stop giving us the silent treatment, you’re freaking Noct out_. Iris sends a cheery _You did great today!_ with a bunch of emojis. Ignis is forthright about being concerned and hoping Prompto isn’t feeling bad. While Prompto’s reading, a new message comes in from Noct. 

_So, uh, I’m thinking we’re gonna come by your house, just to check, OK?_

Prompto looks at the time. It’s 6.30 am. He was asleep for over twelve hours. And also, Noct messaged him at 6.30 am. Noctis Lucis Caelum. Is awake at 6.30 am and messaging him. 

Shit. 

_I’m fine_ he taps out as fast as possible, and sends it to Noct. _Fell asleep, sorry._

The reply comes through before Prompto’s sent the second message. 

_Cool_

Two seconds later:

_You’re definitely fine?_

_Definitely fine_ Prompto types, leaning back against the bed. He feels pretty bad for worrying Noct. And apparently everyone, even maybe including Iris. Is he really so unstable that they all think if he doesn’t reply to them in ten minutes, it means he’s, like – um. Like, freaking out under his bed? Which – 

OK, fine. Prompto is kind of unstable. But actually, right now, he kind of is fine. Maybe. Probably. OK, so there’s still the low-grade anxiety curdling his stomach that hasn’t left him since The Cattening (or maybe since he was six years old), but he’s not about to have a panic attack or anything. So everyone needs to just chill and let him freak out under his bed in peace. 

He reads the messages again before he gets up off the floor, though. 

~

That day, Gladio sets up an obstacle course for Prompto in the gym. There’s, like, rope-climbing and hoop swinging and vaulting over stuff and crawling through things. It’s the kind of thing Prompto would have dreaded before – before. And he dreads it today, too, except that by the time he’s tried it three or four times, he’s – kind of OK at it? Not completely failing? Actually maybe – good? 

Gladio slaps him on the shoulder and calls him _Miss Teen Insomnia Hottest Crownsguard_ a lot, and it’s pretty annoying, but in a standard Gladio-is-annoying way, not in a _I want to hide under the bed_ kind of way. Which is – different. (Also, he’s definitely not going to win Miss Teen Insomnia’s Hottest Crownsguard competition, not given – all the other Crownsguard, and he thought that would make him feel relieved but actually he feels weirdly a little disappointed.)

After training, they go to Noct’s apartment. There’s a bunch of marks on the wall in the Prompto shelf corner, showing where the different parts are going to go, and Prompto inspects it and thinks – yeah, OK. A Prompto shelf would be pretty cool. He’d be able to sit on it even after the surgery, so – that’s cool. 

“How was training?” Noct asks from the couch. 

Prompto sits down in his box and thinks about it. 

“Yeah, good,” he says at last. It’s a couple days until his meeting with Cor and he’s starting to think that maybe he won’t totally embarrass himself. 

“Cool.” Noct tosses a controller his way and Prompto--

\--huh.

“Did you – change products again?” 

Noct sits up a little. Prompto inhales. He still smells of Iggy’s deodorant, but there’s a lot less of that, now. He actually smells – kind of OK. Without all the chemicals, there’s a kind of clean scent of _Noct_ , like, the way he smells when he’s been working out, but way toned down. It’s good. Not as good as Iggy, but that’s a pretty high bar. But also--

“I took, like, three showers,” Noct says. “And I didn’t put on as much deodorant. So – is it OK?” He gestures at himself and the _but also_ hits Prompto again. It’s – something bad. He really doesn’t like it. He kind of wants to – hiss at Noct. Which he’s not going to do, obviously, because haha, humans don’t hiss, that’s – yeah, that’s a cat thing. But Noct’s been trying so hard, and Prompto doesn’t want to make him feel bad, so he grabs the controller and tries to control his expression.

“Yeah, bud,” he says. “Great job!” 

“Yeah?” Noct looks pleased and then – expectant. “You, uh – want to sit on the couch?” 

“No, I’m good.” Prompto stares determinedly at the screen. “Are we playing, or what?” 

There’s a tiny pause, then Noct sighs.

“Yeah, I guess.” 

~

The thing is – the thing is, Noct smells bad. Or – Prompto can’t quite figure it out, because actually, Noct smells better than he’s ever smelled in Prompto’s presence before. But then sometimes he moves in a certain way and he – smells bad. Not even bad in a _too much Greatsword_ way, or even in a _too much sweating_ way. He smells bad in a way that makes Prompto – really kind of angry. He just can’t quite figure out what the issue is, so he does his best not to get angry – because really, who gets angry about the way their best bud smells? – and they play a bunch of videogames and everything’s fine, except--

“Um, so,” Noct says, putting his controller down after killing the fuck out of a skeleton horde. “Have I done something to piss you off?” 

“Huh?” Prompto looks round, trying for his best innocent expression. “Me? No. Why? Definitely not.” 

“Oh. OK.” Noct picks up the controller, then puts it down again. “I mean, because – you’re kind of – off? Is this about yesterday?” 

Prompto chews his lip. Noct shifts, and another waft of the bad smell comes Prompto’s way. And he – suddenly realises what it is. Well, shit. 

Noct leans forward over the arm of the couch. “Is it a cat thing?” he says. “You can tell me. I really want you to. Maybe we can figure it out together.” 

Prompto stares at him. He could – just – not. He could not talk to Noct, and pretend nothing’s going on, and next time Noct showers the problem will be solved anyway. So he should do that. He shouldn’t cause problems for his friends, especially over something so weird and dumb. 

“You know I got your back, right?” Noct says. “Whatever it is.” 

And Prompto--

“Did you, uh, did you happen to, like, um, see a, like, a – a cat this morning?” he says. 

Noct blinks. “Uh – yeah. Oh, yeah, I did see one, on the way back from the Citadel.”

Prompto nods. He stares at the polished floor. Fuck, he feels stupid. This is so stupid. 

“Did you, um – did you touch it?” Like he doesn’t know the answer. Noct never could resist cats, even asshole cats. 

“Yeah,” Noct says. Then there’s this little intake of breath. “Whoa. Wait – can you – can you _smell_ that?” 

Prompto looks up to see that Ignis and Gladio have tuned into the conversation. Ignis looks thoughtful. Gladio looks – impressed? Noct, though, he looks – a little worried. 

“I mean, yeah,” Prompto says. “It like – rubbed all over your hand or something, right?” 

“Um.” Noct looks down at his hand.

Gladio snorts. “What, you territorial?” 

There’s a silence. Prompto stares at the floor.

“So, I’m just gonna go – wash my hands,” Noct says, jumping to his feet. 

The movement sends another wave of the asshole-cat smell Prompto’s way and he realises that he doesn’t want Noct to wash his hands. Like, that would be _better_ , in that he wouldn’t smell of asshole-cat any more, but what Prompto really wants – what Prompto really wants--

As Noct walks past him, Prompto reaches out and grabs his hand. Noct freezes, and Prompto just can’t help himself. He pulls Noct down and rubs his cheek across the palm of Noct’s hand. The smell is really way too strong this close up, and Prompto thinks _fuck it_ , because he’s already done the weird thing and also he really cannot deal with Noct smelling like this, and he rubs his cheek on Noct again, then rubs it on the back of his hand, up his forearm, and then just rubs his whole head on Noct because fuck it feels really good. 

He’s not sure how long he keeps at it for, but by the time he’s done, Noct’s hand smells very thoroughly of Prompto, which is exactly what Prompto wanted. He lets go of Noct’s hand, sits back in his box, and then realises that – shit. He just – he just--

He looks up at Noct, hunching down into his box, and Noct – looks overjoyed. Like, possibly actually literally glowing. 

“Um, is that better now?” Noct asks in a strangled kind of voice.

Prompto clears his throat. Fuck, he’s embarrassed. But he’s not – terrified? That’s weird. 

“Yeah,” he says, trying to sound gruff and manly and landing somewhere close to _did you swallow some sandpaper?_ “Yeah, it’s good. Sorry.” 

“Don’t be sorry,” Noct says, sitting back down on the couch. He smiles at Ignis, then at Gladio, then just sits smiling stupidly at nothing at all. 

“So, uh--” Prompto says, grabbing his controller. “Want to, um, kill some more skeletons and shit?” 

Noct picks up his controller, still with that beatific smile on his face. “I definitely do,” he says. 

~

Later, when they think Prompto can’t hear – which he can, because hello, two sets of ears – he overhears Ignis say _Now don’t go seeking out strange cats just to get Prompto to scent-mark you. That wouldn’t be fair on him._

And Noct says, _Oh, shit, I hadn’t even thought of that_ , like it’s something that just got put on his to-do list.

~

That evening, Prompto sits in his new box at home and thinks. The thing is, he really wants some jerky. He’s been going through it pretty fast, mainly from nerves, he thinks, and the bumper pack that Gladio bought a few days ago is gone. But if he wants jerky, that means he needs to go outside. Go to a convenience store. Interact with the cashier. And he can’t – he can’t do that. Not without Gladio as camouflage. He can’t do that. 

Can he?

He really wants jerky. 

But he’s scared to go outside. 

But he can’t call Gladio every time he wants to go outside to get jerky. 

So he can’t have any jerky. 

But he really wants jerky. 

But he--

Prompto growls in frustration and stands up. He grabs the oversized sweatshirt and pulls it on over his tail, then finds Iris’s pink headband from where he left it on the coffee table and shoves it on his head. Fuck it. _Fuck it_. He can’t just – be a prisoner for the rest of the month. He _can’t_. So he’ll--

He’ll go outside. That’s what he’ll do. 

He goes outside. 

It’s dark out, which is helpful. His nerves feel like they’re on fire, but Prompto’s neighbourhood is pretty quiet and he doesn’t even see anyone on the way to the convenience store. He goes to the one that’s a little further away – they don’t know him there, so they’re less likely to have made the connection with the guy on the news. When he gets there, he takes three deep breaths, then opens the door. 

The guy behind the counter glances up, does a quick double take, then shrugs and looks back down at his book. Prompto tries to suck in a breath through his closing throat and grabs three packs of jerky, then stumbles to the counter and drops them in front of the guy. 

“Four-fifty,” the guy says. He’s an older guy, greying at the temples. He looks up at Prompto. At Prompto’s ears. He frowns slightly.

Prompto’s vision starts to blur a little.

“They make moving ones now?” the guy says, then sighs. “Guess I know the next thing my daughter’s gonna be begging for.” 

“Haha,” Prompto says, sounding maybe a little hysterical. “Yeah, you know it!” 

Then he hands over his cash, grabs his jerky, and manages not to run until he’s made it out of the door of the store. 

Then he runs.

~

When he gets home, he slams the door and presses his forehead to it. He’s sweating and maybe crying a little. He heaves in a breath, then two breaths, and then he starts counting them like Gladio’s always telling him. Then he rips open one of the packages with shaking fingers and shoves a piece of jerky in his mouth. He bites his tongue trying to chew it, but – but he did it. He went out and got the fucking jerky, and he didn’t even make Gladio come with him. And now he has jerky. So fuck you, giant hand in the sky. You are not the boss of Prompto Argentum. 

Eventually, he calms down enough to stand up straight and contemplate his next move. He’s halfway up the stairs, thinking about the safe, dark space under the bed, when he thinks – no. No, not yet. Maybe later, but for now--

He goes to the living room and sits in his box. He chews his jerky and checks his phone. There’s a message from Noct. 

_You good, bro?_

Prompto contemplates it for a few seconds. Then he writes a reply. 

_Yeah. I’m fine._


End file.
